I’ve been hearing a lot of loose talk lately about how, as long as we’re all stuck in this life together, we should work together to get through it. What a heap of crap. Let’s get this straight right now, pal: I don’t need you to help me get through my life, and I certainly have no intention of helping you get through yours.
Listen, I got slapped into this world alone. Like most male heirs, I was misunderstood as a child, so I isolated myself from everyone at Phillips-Exeter Academy. The day I finally inherited Grantham Petrochemical Consolidated, the first thing I did was arrange things so I wouldn’t have to talk to anyone. My second wife is a complete stranger to me. I’ve worked hard to alienate myself from my kids. I go to sleep every night alone. And let me tell you, it’s a pretty sweet life. So unless you’ve got a hot stock tip or you’re a golf pro who knows how to get rid of a leftward slice, I’d greatly appreciate it if you stayed the hell out of my path.
Many people have trouble understanding this. “Join in and lend a hand!” they say. “We’re all on this crazy rock together!” No, we most definitely are not on this crazy rock together. You are on this crazy rock alone. I’ve got enough to worry about making my own life livable, which isn’t easy considering I’m not even supposed to have salt anymore on account of my hypertension, which in turn is probably causing my lousy golf game. If I were to join together with you to try to make things better, we’d just both wind up being disappointed. Or, more likely, you’d be disappointed and I’d be furious, because if there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s non-company-owning pissants wasting my time.
They say it takes all kinds. But that’s just more make-nice poormouth church talk. Like hell it takes all kinds. Does it take the kind who’s such a bad waiter he can’t remember that I asked for my dressing on the side? Evidently, it does, because it happens at the country club at least once a week. Does it take the kind who can’t wax a car without leaving streaks on the trim? I guarantee you it does, because the Mercedes in my garage is Exhibit Fucking A. And does it take the kind who sits around feeling sorry for himself because H. Gordon Grantham III won’t hand him an education on a silver platter so he’ll be employable? Because, let me tell you, there are plenty of those types, too.
“Why can’t we all just get along?” is another ridiculous question. If all these Mexicans I’m supposed to “get along with” really cared, they’d do a better job keeping my lawn looking good. But they don’t. Apparently, that’s what “getting along” really means—doing a shitty job on an important person’s prize azalea bushes and then hoping they don’t can your wetback ass. Well, if that’s what “getting along” and “being in this together” means, you can count me out.
Now get the hell out of my office!
