older dudes in suits

i work in an office complex. the company i work for is pretty laid back with the dress code. it's totally cool for me to show up to work in a t shirt and jeans. when it's cold i can wear a hoodie. in the summer we can even wear shorts as long as they go below the knees.

but there's older dudes at my job and in the other offices in our building who do dress in suits. i see them all the time inside and outside the building, in the cafe for breakfast and lunch, outside for smoke breaks.

i'm not sure if the older dudes at my job in particular are dressing up voluntarily or if there's some executive dress code that i don't know about cuz i'm not an executive employee.

who knows?

what i am sure of is this.... when i see older dudes in suits, i wonder how they feel. how do they feel about dressing up in a suit everyday? how do they feel about their job and what they do for a living? do they still follow their dreams? do they have dreams anymore? do dreams stop at a certain age? for all i know, maybe they are living their dream within the confines of an office building that i never associate with dreams.

when they go home, do they look forward to it? are they married, single, divorced? kids? no kids? are they alone and lonely? or maybe they're alone and content. maybe they live in a big house with a big family and everyone in their family drives them crazy. or maybe they have a family and they're perfectly fucking content with that.

when i see older dudes in suits, i'm not looking at them. i'm trying to use them as a mirror to look at myself. there's no way to know who's happy or sad or how anyone really feels about anything. but when i look at the older dudes in suits, i wonder about my own happiness. i begin to wonder about my own dreams.

when i enter the office everyday, i become so numb to these things. if i live my life day to day, i always figure it's good enough to just get through one more day and live to see a tomorrow with a secure form of employment.

and this isn't some kinda, 'i hate my job' rant. my job's fine. it doesn't make me sad. it doesn't depress me. i don't crave a different job and the idea of looking at classifieds for some other job horrifies me.

but i don't love my job either. i don't have a passion for what i do. i have a passion to survive and collect paychecks so that i can pay the rent on time and keep up with all of life's other expenses. it's that passion that keeps me going every single day.

and then i see the older dudes in suits and i realize that i've lost my way in the daily grind. i have dreams, but i don't think about them as much as i used to. my dreams aren't as loud and vivid as they used to be. there were points in my life where i couldn't turn the dream machine off... everyday was filled with thoughts of what i really wanted to do in life. but as the days turn into years, the thoughts pop up less frequently. the volume's been turned down.

i'm not mad at the older dudes in suits. i'm mad at myself for the thought that i could realistically see myself as one of them. and i don't wanna do that. i have nothing against the older dudes in suits, but it's just not for me. i can't envision my soul confined to cubicles and neckties from now till retirement. just typing the words feels like some sort of punishment... like maybe if i force myself to write the statement on a chalkboard 100 times, i'd finally drill the point home to the center of my soul where it would explode and become impossible to contain.

i'm going back to dreaming again. i have dreams. i'll envision them and chase them. and if i end up an older dude in a suit, i'll be an older dude in a suit still chasing after dreams. cuz i don't ever wanna say i'm too old to dream or too old to have dreams or too old to chase dreams.

when i see those older dudes in the suits, i envision me... i see me in a future after i throw in the towel, after i completely give up on my dreams and decide to willingly hold hands with a corporation till i can start to collect my 401k.

i'm not going out like that. i have dreams.