Marital Arts – Martial Law

I know exactly where you are. I know what you are doing. I know what you did last summer. Are you in the house alone?

How well can you ever really know another human being? You think that person is your friend? How would they react when the chips are really down? Or, in some cases, what have they already done behind your back? (Past tense.)

Believe it or not, I haven’t shared all of the juiciest tidbits about my boss. Not yet. But wait, there’s more!

Yes, I’ve deliberately held back when it comes to revealing all that could be revealed. The man is a veritable gold mine of asshat behavior. Call it some sick sense of decorum or good form, but (unlike him) I have my limits.

I do want to paint an accurate portrait of the lumbering mass but I have to be choosey. And some stories I’ll probably end up taking to my grave. But I have decided the following should be made available for public consumption. And it’s 100% true. I couldn’t make up shit like this.

One thing that makes the boss so special is the sheer totality of what he is. He brings his A-game to every person, every situation. Employees, of course. But also customers, friends, his children, and people he meets on the street.

Oh, wait. I almost forgot.

He also brings it to his wife.

Over the years on this blog I’ve told you about some of the stunts pulled by my boss. I used to think they were incredible. Now, sadly, I merely see them as routine.

• There was the time his wife begged him to leave work to have dinner with her and the kids. He said no. He told her he was too busy and there was too much work to do. After she left he immediately fired up the video games. Yes, right in front of the employees. That makes quite the statement, eh?
• In the beginning the boss wanted to buy lunch for the office every Friday as a team-building exercise. In theory that’s a great idea. But the idea didn’t last long because it turned into yet another way for him to push people around. Eventually, one by one, all employees opted-out and Friday Lunch was no more. I’m proud to say I was the first one out.
• Our workplace is completely unprofessional and the boss does not follow basic standards of hygiene. This includes his body odor (he doesn’t shower) and the fact that there is no sound of running water after he flushes the toilet and immediately flings the door open and stomps back into the office in his Crocs. This was yet another factor in us rejecting him fat-fingering our foods.
• The boss makes no effort to maintain plausible deniability between his employees and his various schemes, lies, greed, boorishness and ramptant unethical behavior.

I’ve often wondered why some people make no effort to be secretive about their asshole behaviors. They’ll do the most amazing things right in front of your eyes with no thought about subterfuge or concealment. There’s absolutely no sense of decorum. It used to make no sense but now I think I’ve figured it out. It’s a way to throw down the gauntlet. It’s about power. It’s their way of saying, “I’m the alpha dog. I don’t care if you see or not. Like, what the fuck would you ever do about it?” Personally I think that’s pretty sick.

Another thing about the boss: He avoids his wife and family and lies to them. A lot. I often wonder, “Why even bother to be married?” For example, they take more separate vacations than any couple I’ve ever known.

One time his wife was on a flight to Hawaii. He mentioned the airline and the flight number. I pulled up an app on my computer and plugged in the information. It showed a map of the world and a little airplane icon that showed the location of her flight. As we worked that icon progressed across the Pacific Ocean until it became stationary around the half-way point. It didn’t move again. It was odd.

Finally the time of her scheduled landing came and went. I was becoming more and more curious. Did his wife arrive in Hawaii? Did the plane have to turn around? Did she even make the flight? And why was that icon just hanging around out there in the middle of the ocean? Did the app’s tracking system fail? Did the plane crash? The thought crossed my mind.

The boss, however, was totally nonplussed. It was as if he didn’t have a care in the world.

Finally curiosity got the better of me and I decided to speak up. “I wonder how your wife is doing? When my wife and I travel separately, we always call each other when the trip is over and check-in. That way we don’t have to worry.”

The boss turned to me and said, “I know exactly where she is. Her plane landed in Hawaii and she’s at the nearest Target to the airport.” Target, eh? That certainly sounded plausible. If I landed in Hawaii I’d head right for the beach and a alcoholic beverage in a coconut. His wife ran to the nearest center of commerce. Yep. That was her, alright.

“How the hell do you know that?”

He gave me a knowing look then turned to his computer. As I watched he pulled up a web browser. “Check this out,” he said.

I watched as the screen filled with Google Maps. There was a blinking blip in the center of the screen. He clicked the zoom button a few times until a parking lot and giant box store was all you could see. You could even see the Target sign out front. The blip was inside the store.

“That’s where she is,” he said.

“Ah,” I replied.

Yawn. I was done with the conversation and turned to go back to work, but the boss had one more thing to say. Something he could have kept to himself. Something he couldn’t wait to share.

“I can track her through her cell phone anywhere she goes. And she has absolutely no idea.” Then, as an afterthought, he added, “Don’t ever mention this to her.”

Holy mother of God!

I couldn’t figure out which was worse. A man secretly bugging his own wife or the fact that he was bragging about it to people that he had to pay to hang out with him.

Sad. Pathetic. Immoral. Evil.

It must be nice to have a rock-solid marriage built on mutual love, trust, openness and respect.

That’s my boss!