Toeward A Better Future

Dear Diary,

Yes, here I am again, R5 reporting in. It's a pain being someone's right fifth toe. The boss fractured my proximal phalange three weeks ago. He is pretty light-hearted about it, but I've had to call in some weight-bearing favours from those pains in Department L, and the larger phalanges here in R. And the metatarsals complain all the time. Now our calcaneus has weighed in as well – what a heel!

I'm also being exposed to blatant fascism. The downward pull of the plantar fascia is a daily irritant. I mean, it's not my fault I'm damaged. Sometimes, bosses are just not very aware of the things they do, and small components like myself bear the brunt of it. Well, in a sense I'm now getting my own back for forty years of being taken for granted.

That's not how I want to be remembered, though. I've been bearing my burdens without complaint and I'd like to think I'm an effective worker who carries his own weight and supports the organisation. My department may consume a lot of energy, but it has been useful work, and I think I provide more than my fair share of stability and balance at my end of the unit.

Three weeks after I was almost retrenched, I've been sent for appraisal. In my view, it was premature. Most of us take six weeks to recover and therapy begins after that. But bosses are impatient and sometimes subject to other pressures (yes, I know a lot about pressure, actually), and so I've been scanned. The break is still there, looking as ugly as ever.

What I'd like to tell the boss is, "Hey! There are things your kind of appraisal doesn't show. It doesn't show matrix-building or anything else except hard calcifications and mineral deposits. You should adopt more holistic methods and leave me alone for now. Stop bearing down on Department R and take a break for a few weeks. The other departments are working fine."

Instead, I tell him nothing. He's taken me for granted for many years; well, tough luck if I am somewhat uncommunicative. I'm injured now and he can't rely on me the way he used to – that's just too bad. If he never understood my usefulness, he should have learnt something of it by now. But I'm not bitter about it. I just toe the line.

In all this, I must say that R4, my neighbour, is a pillar of strength. The company made us hang out a lot together and although boss seems to think it suspicious, I think it is a good arrangement. He helps to spread the weight. I also feel bad about our departmental head, R1.

R1 has been holding things together on his side, but he seems to be buckling a little under the pressure. He's still a big player though. The organisation must move on, and to do that we must put our best foot forward. He knows that, and I think the fact that he's shouldering the responsibility (metaphorically speaking, we don't want the Army units after us) helps us all.

Ah well, it's time for my medication and for the boss to commune with company headquarters. HQ is very distant from a minion like myself. But as I always say, better a minion than a bunion.

Yours, R5.