I had always been afraid. However, as self-serving as this may sound, I never believed this to be a cause for shame or regret, even though an intolerable suffering may ensue from such a trait. It seemed to me that the finest people, as people go, cannot help but betray a fair portion of fear and insecurity, even full-blown panic. On the other hand, someone must have a considerable dose of the swine in their make-up to get through even a single day unafflicted by trepidations of one sort or another, not to mention those who go out of their way to court dangerous encounters, fearlessly calling attention to themselves, figuratively waving their arms and declaring to everyone within range, “Hey, look at me. I’m up here. See what I can do. I’m the one you have to knock down. I’m the one.”
Of course there is a measure of beast’s blood in anyone who aspires to maintain a place in the world, anyone who lacks that ultimate decency to remove themselves from the herd either by violence to themselves or total capitulation to their dread. It’s simply a matter of degree.
At the company where I had been a longtime employee, the purest breed of swine was represented by the seven persons with whom I met in a conference room according to a weekly schedule. I had risen, somewhat reluctantly but with a definite touch of swinishness, to the position of a supervisor in my division of a company in which there were countless other divisions. This made it necessary to attend these meetings along with six others of my kind and a seventh who was our superior by virtue of his having out-swined the rest of us.
During a meeting of my own staff, someone whose mind was not fixated, as was mine, on the swine analogy, referred to these persons with whom I met, according to a weekly schedule, as The Seven Dwarfs.
“So what does that make me, Dave—Snow White?”
“No, Frank,” interjected Lisa, “that would make you Prince, uh, what’s-his-name.”
“Charming,” said Lois.
“Pardon me?” replied Lisa.
“Prince Charming. Didn’t you at least see the movie?”
This remark caused a hurt look to cross Lisa’s face. It was a good one, very realistic.
“Hey, I was just kidding,” said Lois, who wasn’t easily taken in by false or exaggerated phenomena.
Lisa perked up again on cue and continued. “That’s right, Prince Charming.”
“Well, thanks for saying that, Lisa,” I said. But I wasn’t quick enough to head off Christine.
“We usually talk nice about Frank behind his back. But it’s okay, you’ve only been here a week.”
“I’m sorry if it sounded like I was trying to score points or something,” said Lisa, actually sounding quite sincere this time. “The department where I used to work—”
“You’re not there any more,” I said. “You’re here. And everyone here used to work somewhere else in the company.”
“Except you, Frank,” said Elias. “You’ve been in this department forever.”
“True enough,” I replied.
