As Paranoia Creeps In

Do you ever get the feeling that everybody knows something except you? Or that everyone is in on something, but somehow they forgot to inform you about it? Wednesday at work, for example, I showed up to the office in the morning at my usual time and found the parking lot practically bare. These people are the epitome of rise-and-shine, and there was no way they were just late to work. This notion was proven throughout the day as the sounds of my lonely keyboard echoed down the empty hallways. It was like two-thirds of the office just decided not to come into work that day. But like I said, these aren’t the people to just miss out on work, so something had to be up, and why wasn’t that something on my calendar?

What was supposed to be a busy day turned out to be a day of nothing. I had two hefty meetings scheduled for that day and both were cancelled abruptly with no reason supplied. I grew more paranoid as I could visualize all of my fellow co-workers off at a barbecue together laughing and chatting, none of them thinking about poor, lonely Chris whom they had forgotten to invite. “Didn’t you get the memo?” they would query once they came back to see me slaving at my desk. Would they even notice?

Some others did show up in the afternoon so I knew that everyone must have had other commitments that just coincided on the same day. Plus, now that schools are getting out, I’m sure people are starting to take time off to go on the infamous family vacation. By the time that work had ended, I had put away any paranoid thoughts that might have been lingering and drove off towards Bakersfield. But while driving I observed a strange occurrence. Where was all the traffic? Usually at that time of day, the traffic is at it’s worse, but there I was happily cruising with no cars in front or behind me. The traffic issue isn’t just with people from my own company, but concerns the employees of all the oil field related companies around this area, of which there are many. So where were they and why weren’t they on the road driving home?

Suddenly the feelings of paranoia started creeping back in as I made record time getting home from work.