If politics is a struggle for power, whether in the political arena, at work, at home, at play, then political proficiency is one's ability to hone in on privilege and snuggle up close; and those preoccupied with task proficiency are left shivering in the hinterlands. I used to do okay focusing on task proficiency but because (I believe) in recent decades political proficiency has overtaken task proficiency as the greater influence and because I now work for a very large organization, (more than 20,000 employees where I believe it has always been politics), I am cold. I am a retirement age senior who would like to not retire but if I cannot find a place that prioritizes task proficiency over political proficiency (or at least allows me to do so beyond a prescribed point), I may have to retire to come in from the cold.

I understand I could warm up at work if my priorities were reversed. But if I become part of the more and more of us who renounce task responsibility in favor of warmth and comfort, who will be left to do the work? I want to do the work! Yet if I am not politically proficient, I am not allowed to do the work. And as a senior, (looked on by many as used-up), even when I do warm up to power, I am still not fairly compensated for my task proficiency. Power is cold and brittle. Yet we still want a cuddle. Why?

Perhaps it is the heated fervor that is mistaken for kindled brilliance. Perhaps it is the shadowed fire that fools me, drawing me into its proximity. Perhaps it is the pyrotechnics that create an illusion of inflamed wisdom. Nonetheless, the dark, innermost core of power remains cold and brittle.