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Previous Your Corner Contributions
TA - Thinkers Anonymous
It started out innocently enough. I began to think at parties now and then
to loosen up. Inevitably though, one thought led to another, and soon I was
more than just a social thinker.
I began to think alone - "to relax," I told myself - but I knew it
wasn't true.
Thinking became more and more important to me, and finally I was thinking
all the time. I began to think on the job. I knew that thinking and
employment don't mix, but I couldn't stop myself.
I began to avoid friends at lunchtime so I could read Thoreau and Kafka. I
would return to the office dizzied and confused, asking, "What is it
exactly we are doing here?"
Things weren't going so great at home either. One evening I turned off
the TV and asked my wife about the meaning of life. She spent that night at
her mother's.
I soon had a reputation as a heavy thinker. One day the boss called me in.
He said, "I like you, and it hurts me to say this, but your thinking has
become a real problem. If you don't stop thinking on the job, you'll have
to find another job."
This gave me a lot to think about.
I came home early after my conversation with the boss. "Honey," I
confessed, "I've been thinking..."
"I know you've been thinking," she said, "and I want a divorce!"
"But Honey, surely it's not that serious."
"It is serious," she said, lower lip aquiver.
"You think as much as college professors, and college professors don't make
any money, so if you keep on thinking we won't have any money!"
"That's a faulty syllogism," I said impatiently, and she began to cry. I'd
had enough. "I'm going to the library," I snarled as I stomped out the
door. I headed for the library, in the mood for some Nietzsche. I roared
into the parking lot and ran up to the big glass doors... they didn't open.
The library was closed. As I sank to the ground clawing at the unfeeling
glass, whimpering for Zarathustra, a poster caught my eye. "Friend, is
heavy thinking ruining your life?" it asked. You probably recognize that
line. It comes from the standard Thinkers Anonymous poster.
Which is why I am what I am today: a recovering thinker. I never miss a
TA meeting.
At each meeting we watch a non-educational video; last week it was
"Porky's."
Then we share experiences about how we avoided thinking since the last
meeting. I still have my job, and things are a lot better at home. Life
just seemed... easier, somehow, as soon as I stopped thinking.
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