Lately, thanks to the wonders of compressed DVD’s, I have been able to redicover Ally McBeal episodes. In one episode, there was a case wherein a janitor was petitioning the court to allow the hospital to let him and his bestfriend the CEO exchange hearts.
Long story, but what touched me there was when the lawyers asked the CEO why he was friends with a janitor. The CEO replied, the saying “lonely at the top” really is true.
As CEO, everyone looks at him as the boss, and everyone is afraid of him so no one acts as themselves around him. All his jokes get laughs even though they’re not funny, and no one dares tell him off. But he says friendship isn’t real unless both sides have the right and the power to tell the other guy to go to hell, which the janitor did three times a week.
When he said that, I got hit with visions of seeing a moderator standing alone on the sidelines during a Christmas party because all his students are afraid to sit beside him, and of officemates trying to pass on to someone else the task of accompanying the boss to a despedida party. These are real images I conjure, experiences that brought pangs to my chest when I witnessed them in the past.
Then I remember a musical play I watched back in High School entitled “Sa Kaharian ng Araw.”
Written in lyrical and captivating Filipino, Sa Kaharian ng
Araw has a simple plot: the search by two friends, Ponce and Paolo, for the
legendary Kaharian ng Araw. The two go for different reasons: Ponce is driven by
the wealth, power and fame this kingdom promises, while Paolo goes because of
his friend.Their long journey takes them through three kingdoms—
Kaharian ng Ulan, Kaharian ng Hangin and Kaharian ng Dilim, each of which cannot
be passed unless a heartbreaking toll is paid to its king. In the end, Ponce,
broken and alone, reaches the Kaharian ng Araw, the end of the journey for which
he has traded everything he holds dear— only to be met by a surprising,
spine-tingling revelation. . . .from Ateneo’s classic play about the rat race staged anew
by Paulo K. Tirol, Philippine Daily Inquirer, February 1999.
In the end, after Ponce had made Paolo give up his beloved guitar, his most prized possession, and after he had to give up Paolo himself, Ponce reached the legendary kingdom of the sun and discovered that there was nothing there, and that since rare was the person who could get this far, he was also all alone. Lonely at the top indeed.
A story with a similar theme is “Hope for the Flowers” where caterpillars struggle to make it up a caterpillar pillar, not hesitating to step on other caterpillars just to get ahead, only to realize once they got on top that all they had once there was the prestige of being there, but there was nothing there, actually.
So I guess, being at the top makes you lonely in lots of ways. You could be lonely because to get on top you had to sacrifice everyone you held dear just to get there.
Or you could be lonely because everyone is scared to come near you.
Still…lonely is lonely. I just have to remind myself of that each time I start thinking about throwing aside everything else just for my job.