Fragments From Floyd

I'm going through the junk drawer that Fragments has become, looking for pieces that might fit this jigsaw puzzle of a book. At the same time, of course in all this digging into the past while returning to past professions in the present, I'm wondering what it is that I do for a living, and why. In all that ruminating and digging, I came across this little tale that seems appropriate regarding the W word.

The world of work has become something I watch from the outside these days. I'll dive back in if the right job comes along. But by the time you reach my age, you know that no matter how good a job looks before you start it, there will be days when you'll need hip waders for mucking around in the barnyard bog most jobs eventually become. I remember when our son, Nathan, was 5 years old, a precocious reader, and eagerly vocal in large groups. He understood what I'm saying here about work. Let me explain.

We were gathered for a meal on the eve of the relocation of a friend and co-worker. A dozen or so friends of the soon-to-be former associate were coming to the end of our last meal together at the Chinese Restaurant in the small Virginia town where we lived. It was time for the fortune cookies.

We went around the table reading our predictable mock-Confusian fortunes. You know the routine. The reading came round the table to young Nathan, who insisted that he would take his turn, and no help here, thank you. He started out with relative ease:
"Your....wor...working....life....will be...fi....filled..."

Here he paused briefly with a furrowed brow. He was stumped by a word he didn't know, but we had worked some with him on phonics (although he was not hooked) and he was determined to make a stab at it. By this time, the entire restaurant crowd was silent, marveling at the reading acumen and general cuteness of this plucky, extroverted little fat-cheeked chap.

"Your working life will be filled...with...(and he completed the sentence loudly in triumph)... EXCREMENT!"

Everybody in the place cracked up! We could hardly catch our breath! It was just too perfect. And was even funnier when we reached over and read that his cookie fortune actually ended with the word EXCITEMENT! Way to go, Nate. You were wise before your time. Out of the mouths of babes.