Unfettered and Alive

On the way to work Friday morning Joni’s “I Was a Free Man in Paris” plays on the radio. I turn up the volume and sit in my car in the parking lot to listen all the way to the end.

“The way I see it,” he said

“You just can’t win it….

Everybody’s in it for their own gain

You can’t please ‘em all

There’s always somebody calling you down.”

The song is said to be about Joni’s agent/promoter David Geffen, creator of Asylum Records in 1970 (I know—that’s a long time ago). It’s about the high cost of selling your soul to the corporation and the longing for freedom from it all.

So--if you work for a corporation, or more generally for money in any sizeable amount, have you automatically sold out? When I hear that phrase “free man in Paris,” I feel a great longing for the freedom of not having to answer to anybody else for things I don’t necessarily believe in—but on the other hand I do try every day to stay true to my principles, even as I also work toward the goals of the corporation as I understand them and when they make sense to me. I focus on treating others with kindness and fairness, and on teamwork.

“I deal in dreamers
And telephone screamers
Lately I wonder what I do it for…”

Sometimes I find myself skating uncomfortably close to some sort of edge; I ask myself again and again whether what I’m doing is right and struggle to stay the course accordingly.

“I was a free man in Paris
I felt unfettered and alive.
There was nobody calling me up for favors
And no one’s future to decide.
You know I’d go back there tomorrow
But for the work I’ve taken on
Stoking the star-maker machinery behind the popular song.”

The ethical tests I usually use at work and elsewhere are: 1) could I explain it to my Mom and 2) would I be able to read about it in the newspaper and be proud of the calls I made. There’s always the option to walk away—you are always the free man in Paris in this sense. There are potentially high costs of course, but you always have to know walking away is an option. Therefore, there is no excuse for violating your core principles, right?