Story 201: I Want to Live Life Like That Puppet Does

            “You got a minute?  I need to vent,” Co-Worker 1 said to Co-Worker 2 as she stuck her head in the latter’s cubicle.

            “Uh, not really,” Co-Worker 2 said, half-turning away from her computer.  “I really have to finish this report now, since it’s due about two days ago.”

            “Know the feeling,” Co-Worker said as she dragged a chair in and slumped onto it.

            “OK, then I’ll just….” Co-Worker 2 turned back to her screen and started typing again.

            “Sure, I just need to complain.”

          “Oh brother, what now?”  Co-Worker 2 asked, not bothering to turn around.  “Did your favorite show morph into an alternate-reality version of itself this season and you have no one else to whine to about how disappointed you are in it?  Again?”

        “You would have made an excellent point, except it’s not my favorite show.”  Co-Worker 1 propped her feet up on the desk, where Co-Worker 2 could see her shoes were in dire need of resoling.  “No, I’m just mad about my attitude.”

            “So am I.”

            “I mean my attitude towards life.  I let everything bother me!”

            “Well, I’m sure you have a lot on your mind.”  Type-type-type.

           “I actually don’t, and that’s part of the problem,” Co-Worker 1 said as she noisily slurped her coffee.  “I’m surrounded by the small stuff, and the small stuff is driving me bonkers!”

          “You want some big stuff, then?  I got some dependent relatives I’m willing to off-load on you, heh-heh-heh – I don’t mean that.”

            Co-Worker 1 felt it was best to keep going.  “I just wish, I don’t know – I wish I could live my life the way that weird puppet does!”

         Co-Worker 2 actually turned to look at Co-Worker 1 again.  “The weird puppet that nobody knows what he is exactly?”

            “Yeah, that guy!  He’s the best.”

            “I don’t understand; he’s a piece of cloth.”

          “I’m not talking about that, of course he’s a piece of cloth – I’m talking about the way they write him!”  This got Co-Worker 1 to take her feet off the desk and sit like a human being.  “I mean, he endures mostly self-inflicted life-threatening ordeals, he occasionally gets kidnapped and tortured, and he LOVES it!”

            “Kidnapped and…?”

        Co-Worker 1 did not hear that as she warmed to her topic: “He’s always open to new experiences; he’s undaunted by failures; he just lives life with such a passion that I will never ever have!”

            “Isn’t he a Whosit?”

            “He’s not like the rest of us, but nobody cares.  And possibly because of that, he is completely non-judgemental!  He is the perfect being!”

            “He also is a being who was made up by puppeteers.”

          “You’re not listening; I know all that, I’m not some nut!”  Co-Worker 1 almost flung her coffee out of the cup in wild gesticulation, then reined in herself.    “I’m just saying I wish I could be that positive, that open-minded, that adventurous, that… happy.”

          “So just be all those things and leave me alone – my supervisor sent me an e-mail for me to see him now about my late report, so I’m probably going to be fired.”

         “See!  If you were that puppet, you’d be thrilled to find out what’s going to happen next!  I think he was actually fired once, and he totally rolled with it!”

        “Bye.”  Co-Worker 2 left the cubicle and walked towards what may be her doom, but more likely would only be a shame session.

         Co-Worker 1 stayed behind for a few moments, staring at her coffee and thinking how unfair life was: of all the things to wish for, she was depressed knowing how much she wanted just one ounce of the positivity that had been bestowed upon a flippin’ puppet.