I missed the subway this morning and got caught in the rain, and just when I thought things couldn’t get worse, I walked in and saw my boss Larry holding Sun Tzu’s The Art of War. I would have rather he’d been carrying a gun.
He was walking around the office, holding it so people could see the cover but no one was asking him about it. It was a crucifix to vampires and we all just kept our eyes on our keyboards.
Just before lunch, he called us in for an “impromptu pow-wow” and when we were all assembled in the boardroom he said, “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle. Worth thinking about.”
Man, we sell travel insurance. Who the fuck is our enemy?
The rest of the day was like that. I asked Larry about the plan to replace Owen who left last month and Larry said, “In the midst of chaos, there is also opportunity.” So I guess we’re not replacing him and we’ll just take on his clients. Or the opportunity is to get someone more skilled than Owen in. I asked for clarification and he said, “Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.”
After that, I had to go and vape in the emergency stairwell for half an hour.
Around 2 o’clock, I had some clients arrive for a presentation. I had booked the boardroom, got it all set up, and met them at the elevators. Making small talk, I walked them into the boardroom and there was Larry, standing by the whiteboard. He had written on it in huge letters: It is easy to love your friend, but sometimes the hardest lesson to learn is to love your enemy. He then bowed at the waist, said “Konnichiwa,” and walked out.
The clients were from Missouri and I’m pretty sure Sun Tzu was Chinese.
I managed to avoid him until the end of the day but as I left I saw him in his office cracking open a copy of Walter Isaacson’s Elon Musk biography and that’s why I’m writing to you to apply for the role you advertised.