Everything you need to know about perspective you can discover through simple analysis. For instance, from where I’m sitting, on a black futon, I see a coffee table and a television and refrigerator door that is ajar. From where I’m sitting, on the futon, I see the flashing green LED light on my communication device (henceforth: comm device), which confirms my location within a designated cellular coverage area, and also, by virtue of not flashing red, confirms that no one attempted to call, text, email, or Blackberry message me between the hour I passed out on the futon last night and the hour I awoke on the futon this morning.
Perspective is such a funny thing! If I had awoken on the recliner instead of the futon, and had been sitting there watching an episode of Malcolm in the Middle prior to work, my view of both the refrigerator door and the LED light on my comm device would be obstructed. The food in my refrigerator might still be rising in temperature; the part of my brain that yearns for human contact might not yet feel like the shards of a pint glass on the floor after having been tossed against a wall. Upon this revelation, I compose a tweet.
I’M SITTING ON THE FUTON
From where I’m sitting, on the subway, I can see a lot of people, many of whom are also sitting, and very likely, contemplating the importance of perspective. One guy near me reads a newspaper. If I had taken a seat on the other end of the train (or in another car), I wouldn’t be able to see him. Perspective! It’s such a funny concept, and yet, somehow profound at the same time. When you go to a movie and sit three-fifths of the way back in the theatre, you see every part of the screen perfectly, just as the director intended. But when you arrive late because your girlfriend couldn’t scrounge up ninety minutes to get ready, and you have to sit in the motherfucking front row, you’re stuck looking at Jim Carrey’s nose hairs for almost two hours. That’s perspective. The people who follow me on Twitter have a right to know what frame of mind I’m in, and perspective often dictates my frame of mind. I remove my comm device from my jacket pocket, and just before the train goes under the river, out of cellular service, I drop a tweet.
I’M SITTING ON THE SUBWAY
From where I’m sitting, at my cubicle, I see other cubicles, other computer monitors, and other people sitting in them. They’re all typing shit and clicking around the computer screen and not reflecting on the powerful phenomenon of perspective, like I am. In perspective it matters where you’re sitting or standing, what direction you’re facing or what wall you’re leaning against. Perspective affects the way you embrace and relate to your environment. The objects you see in your driver-side mirror are not as close as they appear. That’s perspective. That’s a concept that seems to escape the inhabitants of the surrounding cubicles. My digital fans, those persons with Twitter accounts who stumbled onto my profile and pressed the follow button, deserve a profound sentence detailing my reflections on the wondrous, inspiring, Platonic form perspective in the workplace, and I use my comm device to deliver it.
I’M SITTING AT MY CUBICLE
Understanding perspective is important if you ever want to understand human existence. However, some people misunderstand perspective, and thus, have a bloated perception of reality, and from where I’m sitting, on a bar stool, I see some of them. At a table, across the bar, they laugh and drink and engage in what appears to be very delightful discourse. But from the bar stool in the darkest corner of the bar, nursing a domestic beer, I see them misappropriate the sublime glory of perspective. If they could comprehend it, they’d be tweeting.
I’M SITTING ON A BAR STOOL
