A/k/a, the Deep State *
May 21
As a bureaucracy becomes more established, it develops its own career structure. It is less dependent, and should be less dependent, on individual personalities. Absolutely no one is indispensable. ~ John Scarlett
Hi! Do you know us? We’re federal employees. Absolutely none of us are indispensable. And because of that, this country didn’t lapse into anarchy in the last couple years when many of us were summarily dismissed from our positions . . .
I stumbled upon these photos while doing ‘deep’ background on something else. This was February 1999. It was a retirement party for Ethel Miller (the lady in black), who was my immediate supervisor at the time. We were in the Office of Government Contracts, Wage and Hour Division, Employment Standards Administration, U.S. Department of Labor (well, it is the government). Specifically we oversaw the compensation for, at that time, 2 million employees of government service contractors. Got it?
[Surprisingly, I still recognize all these people. I don’t remember all the names, but I remember all the faces. Blogging seemed to be the best way to distribute the pictures to everyone . . . ]
[Several of the people contained herein were also, at one time or another, my immediate supervisors . . . ]
[I have no idea why I would need such a variety of supervisors?]
[Everybody liked Ethel. People came from other agencies, other departments. What fun!]
I have an institutional fear of big government. I have an institutional opposition to bureaucracy. ~ Rush Limbaugh
In most legislatures, punctilious attention to correct usage is considered elitist. The word ‘government,’ for example, is normally pronounced ‘gummint’; bureaucracy is ‘bureaucacy’; fiscal comes out ‘physical,’ and one moves not to suspend the rules, but to ‘suppend.’ ~ Molly Ivins
People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. ~ Maya Angelou
The trouble with retirement is that you never get a day off. ~ Abe Lemons
Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened. ~ Dr. Seuss
It is better to live rich than to die rich. ~ Samuel Johnson
[This was us. I think Tim (2nd from left) took over as the supervisor after Ethel . . . ]
[I worked with a lot of these folks for a long time. A lot of the people I came in with were gone. I started to think it was getting time for me to go. I did, two years later . . . ]
[This is Ethel and her crew. During the whole time we were together, at no time did the fascists or Commies take over our government! And every Friday, we’d all go to lunch together – usually at the Hyatt, a little over a block away and where the C-SPAN studios were . . .]
[The hugger and I are still in contact, many years into retirement . . . ]
[These two were part of a group that went to ride all the roller coasters at Hershey Park, shortly before I retired . . . ]
[We’ve lost Bo; Vanessa (on the right) went on to become labor relations advisor for the Army Corps of Engineers . . . ]
[Ethel, Vanessa, and Doug, one of our lead attorneys who sends informational (and silly) emails on a regular basis . . . ]
Working people have a lot of bad habits, but the worst of these is work. ~ Clarence Darrow
[TJ and Clarence (on the right) were with our agency the whole I was there . . . ]
[As were Jessie and Mary (2nd & 3rd from left) . . . ]
[Bill was my whole career bud, who at one time was also my first line supervisor. We go on cruises together in our senior years . . . ]
[Terry, also a career long bud, who was the long time manager of our historic agency softball team . . . ]
My parents didn’t want to move to Florida, but they turned sixty and that’s the law. ~ Jerry Seinfeld
Retirement at sixty-five is ridiculous. When I was sixty-five I still had pimples. ~ George Burns
When men reach their sixties and retire, they go to pieces. Women go right on cooking. ~ Gail Sheehy
[I believe this event took place at Hogate’s. At the time it was a bellwether restaurant on the Washington, D.C. waterfront. I believe it is no longer there as that whole area has undergone an extensive makeover.]
I wanted to have more time to play and reflect, but I find retirement more stressful than having a nice, steady job because I have to make decisions about where I want to be. ~ Walter Cronkite
Up Next: Who knows what’s left to be discovered in the archives.
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