Sent 1/10/2002 12:00 PM
On December 28th, I made an appointment with Verizon (our telephone company) to connect our telephone in our new apartment. I was certainly disturbed by the fact that the appointment would have to take place within a 4 (four) hour time-frame in which I would have to wait at my apartment for their service-persons to arrive. Nevertheless, trying to be understanding of Verizon's vast service-orders, I agreed to wait at my apartment on January 9th from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. for someone to come and connect our phone.
Graciously, my boss allowed me to leave work at 12:30 p.m. to go home and wait for Verizon to arrive. There I sat and waited. 1:00 p.m. no Verizon. 2:00 p.m. no Verizon. 3:00 p.m. no Verizon. 4:00 p.m. no Verizon. 5:00 p.m. no Verizon. 5:30 p.m. no Verizon. Yes, Verizon never showed. 4 hours of my life I allowed Verizon to have in order to receive a phone line, only to have Verizon's neglect say that my time is not valuable to them. Why should it be? I'm only a number to them. Does Verizon regard me as a human being? Does Verizon realize that I'm a person rescheduling his life for them? Obviously not.
Today when I called Verizon to express my disappointment and anger at their negligence, the very nice operator told me that he would reschedule my appointment for Friday (between 8:00am & 5:00pm), that the service-person would try to get in via my super, and that he would waive the $55.00 installation fee. I hung up feeling much better.
But then it hit me! Through this transaction, Verizon is stating that 4 hours of Chad Gurley's life is worth approximately $55.00. Wow! It made me stop to think, just what is my time worth??? What is one second of my life worth? What is one year of my life worth? My heart screams that my time is worth much more than $55.00! My soul says that my time is priceless, that there could never be an earthly measure of what my time is worth! However, the society in which we live puts a monetary value on each human being's time, ALL the time. This is wrong! This is injustice!
We must change the world my friends. If you think you are free, you are wrong. We are all slaves to this "reality" in which we naively believe. It's time we STOP being "realistic", and start freeing our souls from this captivity. The time in your life is precious. It comes only once, and then is gone. Every second that ticks by is a real one that you'll never be able to retrieve again. Let it be known, your time is valuable. Let it be known that your LIFE is valuable, as is every life on the planet.
