Dream A Little Dream

Over the last four days, I repeatedly experienced a dream I haven't had in a very long time.

The one where I'm wandering around a bustling financial city center again, shivering, in the middle of July. Driven and bright people surround me -- ones who value the intellectual satisfaction of their jobs instead of the tokens of affluence that a salary affords. We find friends who we can laugh with till we all hurt, over very lengthy dinners out.

We talk about code, silly brain teasers, and tell horrible jokes.

Work is full of purpose, walking in and out of offices shared with valued colleagues. Between energetic debates about one topic or another, we all settle into focused quiet, occasionally staring out large windows facing onto a city blending old and new, water and granite.

Every 20th car outside might be an SUV.

Today I woke up. As the dream faded into memory and the sadness settled slowly into my heart, I pondered: Are the too-bad-to-be-true accounts which I describe here endemic in corporate life everywhere, or is it disproportionately exacerbated by a famously superficial locale? Is it the system, or is it the people?

The Zone: A state of mind? A state of play? Or just a different place in the state?