Our Story
by Tony Iveson

My partner and me had lived the wage-slave "life" forever it seemed, like everyone else. We hated it but had not analysed it thoroughly and never even sought a way out. Dreams of the winning-the-lottery type were as far as it went. It began to change when he contracted cancer 10 years ago. Given 18 months to live tops, everything went to hell for a while. However, he beat all the odds and was one of the five percent f survivors. It was that frightening and unsettling experience that started real thought - but even then it was slow to take off.

He was terrified his company would discard him and that we would need to live on one income. Imagine that, he was so progammed by the wage-slave's mindset that instead of solely concentrating on defeating disease, he was thinking about getting back to work so that the bosses would not exercise their powers of dismissal! Eventually, he went back to work part-time out of fear that the health insurance taken out by his company would be cut off and then they would sack him. He was still tired and ill from a harsh chemotherapy regime and his doctor suggested part-time work. His company agreed to this, not because they were wonderful people, but because they did not wish to gain a reputation as cruel employers, which they would have done because we would have made sure of it! Still, the full attitude shift had not yet happened. It was the part-time salary that really made us realise that we could manage on less. The mortgage was paid every month and all bills were met - the sky did not fall in. Yes, we had to pull back on entertaining and going out to the pub and parties. "Friends" who were really just people from work began to fall away - we weren't in their league anymore! It was all such a relief - we did not care a bit.

After a couple of years of this, a true friend (a lawyer) said my partner really did not need to do this anymore and she helped him to get medical retirement. She argued that though it was yet a smaller monthly sum to live on, the cash settlement that was part of the deal would produce enough money to pay off the mortgage and we would never need to worry about that again. We did it.

Then it happened to me. My slave owners (the British Civil Service) for whom I had toiled uselessly (completely pointless work) for 20 years was to hive off the department in which I worked to a company. I saw, smelt and almost tasted the new arseholes I would have to kiss and realised that the shit they were producing was even harder to swallow. I was lucky and managed to jump ship a week before the takeover by transferring to another government department where corporate twaddle had not infested the place to the same extent. Within six months an opportunity came up for a move out of London to the north. It still meant working for my department, but in a better environment. No mortgage and rising house prices in London helped us to buy a great house in the north of England, in the countryside.

A year and a half on from our move north, I still dislike the office environment. But again, crazy rising house prices in this part of the country are presenting another opportunity. This is the big one. We are contemplating selling up again and moving further into the countryside. If we do it, we will buy a house where we can provide bed and breakfast to tourists and then we will be both free of wage-slavery. We will not be entirely free of course - we will still need to do productive work to live. But it will be in our own home and it will mean no-one breathing down our necks to meet pointless targets and getting nasty if we don't.

This is where we are at now - it has taken ten years to get here. But I can truly say that though I have some concerns, I am no longer scared that not having a job spells disaster.

When I was a child, my maternal grandfather tried to tell me that work was a "good thing", in itself and for itself. At 6 years old I instinctively knew that this was drivel. I tried to argue back and was frowned on for being lippy. I remember his words that struck me as bleak then, and they still do:

"A fair day's work, for a fair day's pay."

Employers say it still in many different ways when what they really intend is to shell out as little as possible for as much sweat and toil they can get. Even when (rarely), there is nothing to do, they insist you stay until the end of the working day because they have bought your time and they will jolly well ensure they get the last nano-second of it! Ultimately, it is about control: their control of us. They fear thought and they fear our freedom, and they never tire of reminding us that they own us. They are lying.