An exceptional day

I was recently in the office of a major and exceptional financial manager on Wall Street. It was an exceptional office, for an exceptional man, in the midst of a truly exceptional life.

Sometimes I do these short films for clients and sometimes I end up in places where I am the equivalent of the man on the moon, if ever there was such a thing, because, that's right, I am a Mooner. I will not believe man walked on the moon until I see evidence.

So I was hired to do some sort of promotional short for this incredibly exceptional banker and there I was, in his exceptional office, shooting him on my super high tech new HD camera from behind a series of monitors and screens that cover his desk. His face would get all serious as he would read some detail on a screen, his eyes darting to another screen, recognizing some important data, he might smile a little, focus somewhere else and pick up his phone and scream some detail into his ear piece.

So it went. Younger than me, smarter than me, certainly wealthier than me and probably all my friends added together, and best of all, he seemed so sad and bored that I wanted to cry. Oh sure, the screens would keep his attention and the minutia of trades and valuation and dancing on the head of a needle all day would keep him high in a way only true junkies could understand, but at the end of the day, his life was boring and tedious, this I would learn at dinner.

If you ever wonder how American society works, go out to an exclusive bistro on Manhattans Upper East Side with a wealthy financier and his latest wife thing. This is a woman who may have been in her 20's and if she was not, she was surgically doing everything in her power to appear that way. Almost skeletal in appearance, she was wearing a slight dress that barely covered her emaciated skinny little arms. She had that big beautiful hair that Italian woman always seem so proud of and Jewish women always tie up in shame. She was neither. When I asked her nationality all she would say was "I grew up in Florida."

The joy of being super wealthy is you do not have to pretend to do much, like have interesting conversations with women who forgot how to eat or that Florida might not be a nationality. No, when you are wealthy, especially super wealthy, all you have to do is be wealthy and a certain type of woman will find you compelling. I am pretty sure these sorts of arrangements have been going on for a really long time, since the oldest profession seems to suggest that women at some point knew there was a value in their sexuality and looks. At least for men with gold.

Sad banker has gold. Lots and lots of gold. So what that buys him in modern society is a great table in an exclusive bistro at one of the best addresses in the world, not really eating a well prepared meal that would cost more than my monthly mortgage payment.

Unhappy banker started drinking in the car ride over and ordered another scotch when we were seated. His beautiful and doll like wife was already seated, drinking a white colored beverage, probably wine, and I was downing shots of tequila just so I might be able to forget.

Skelator, this wife sort of subject, would not order food, so we continued to drink, with the sad banker orderubg a bloody steak and I had the vegetarian plate. Over dinner I asked the sad banker what the short film I was creating would be used for. He said it was part of a new web series the company was creating. Boring I thought, but remained interested because if a wealthy banker and his minions would all be needing short films for a new web project and I became the go-to guy, I could someday have a skeleton wife, drink endlessly and wear nice shiny clothes. Where could I sign up?

At some point, post steak, but before Skeletor had to run to the ladies room to join all the other Upper East Side matrons in a nice round of vomiting, I asked Sad Banker how he got into the whole financial services industry. He studied here and there, he told me, did not have focus, but needed work, a friend had a newly minted MBA from Harvard and had landed a great job and helped him in the door. That was it, the rest of finding a niche and exposing it.

Me; You have a great office.

SB; I know, right?

Me; Car service, great office, beautiful wife.

SB; Hot piece on the side.

Me; Well, see I did not know about that.

SB; Man's got to have options.

Me; Spoken like a true banker.

SB; Guess the lingo comes with the territory.

Me; Funny how that works. You look sad to me.

SB; How can you say that?

Me; Just an observation.

SB; I have a house in the Hamptons. Never mind, I could go on and on. It's stuff, and I have a lot.

Me; And you are happy then?

SB; Depends on how you define happy.

Me; That's what I meant. I know you have stuff and a beautiful wife.

SB; She is beautiful, right?

Me; I just said that, yeah. But you don't seem happy.

SB; What is it with you liberals always trying to find a way to devalue capitalism?

Me; Huh? I did nothing like that. I am talking about you.

SB; Trust me, I have stuff, I drive nice cars, sleep in great beds, fly first class or private and life is great.

Me; Which makes the whole dour look you have seem remarkable.

SB; Still not sure where you are going with this. I have an exceptional life. As you noticed, an exceptional wife, office, clothes, vacations, the list, really, could go one and on. What I don't get is what sort of agenda you might have.

Me; No agenda. Just seems ironic, you have everything, right? And yet, you seem to have an air of deep apprehension.

SB; Well, it might have been that I was being followed by you and your crew all day.

Me; That's true. But we follow people all the time, after a few minutes almost everyone gets used to it.

SB; So that's not it? What's your guess Dr. Freud?

Me; Oh, see, right there, you do that avoidance thing by bringing in my medical background.

SB; You have a medical background? I thought you made films.

Me; Sometimes, but sometimes I pretend to have a medical background.

SB; Pretend?

Me; We should have more tequila.

SB; You're the only one drinking tequila.

Me; Probably for the better.

I woke up at a friends loft in Chelsea. Not sure how I got there, or why I was wearing what appeared at first to be a hand me down costume from Peter Pan. I did find some clothes that fit a little better than green leotards and I went to breakfast.