CHICAGO — Local 10-year-old Jake Marshall got a surprising glimpse into adulthood during Take Your Child to Work Day when he discovered that his father, Greg Marshall, spends an alarming amount of time sobbing in the office bathroom, confirmed sources who thought it was about time he learned some hard truths.
“I thought grown-ups just, like, worked and drank coffee, but Dad’s in the bathroom more than he’s at his desk. He says he’s ‘answering emails,’ but I can hear him crying like when Mom left,” said the wide-eyed fifth-grader. “I thought work was about making money, but I guess it’s mostly about slowly accepting that your dreams are dead. I don’t get it. When you’re an adult, you finally have money to afford all the ice cream, Xbox games, and flamethrowers you want. I guess all that can’t even reverse the negative effects of an office job.”
The boy’s father, a middle manager at local consulting firm MidasTouch, initially planned to show his child the ropes of the business world.
“I wanted to teach him about spreadsheets and synergy, but it turns out the only synergy I demonstrated was between existential dread and my crippling mortgage,” the father of three explained, blinking away tears. “The only silver lining is that maybe he will be dissuaded from being a ‘motivated’ person and become a skateboarder or a musician in a band that goes nowhere. If I could tell the youth of the world one thing, it would be to save yourself and DO NOT go to college! Be a nobody, play video games, and smoke weed. Anything else is just inviting a lifetime of torment and pain.”
A spokesperson from the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, thought he needed to suck it up.
“There’s actually a surprising amount of purpose that can be found in creating wealth for the shareholders. You just have to find it within yourself. It’s in there if you look hard enough, I promise,” said spokesperson Todd Fisher. “Men need to toughen up and stuff down every emotion they feel bubbling up to the surface—no one ever built a successful career on feelings. Maybe if this dad valued productivity over mental health, he wouldn’t be crying in the bathroom. And he really shouldn’t be showing his son vulnerability like that. This is not what the workplace is all about. No, it’s about pizza parties in lieu of raises.”
At press time, the boy took his father to his school for Career Day, but the 57-year-old spent most of his time crying in the library’s restroom.