IT'S A JOB AVOIDING WORK

Fearing he was bound for a work-for-dole farm, Pyotr Patrushev tried a little vocational therapy ....

IT took me and my family almost two years to see why all my attempts at economic self-sufficiency bore so little fruit. As my old folks sat in front of the TV watching Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em, my old man occasionally muttering deprecatory remarks under his breath, I was struck by a momentous realisation. But of course! I was not simply a dole bludger. I was suffering from a well-advanced case of work phobia.

Did I not exhibit all the classic defense mechanisms in my attempts to justify my lack of interest in any activity that could even remotely be called gainful? My symptoms: Denial: How many times had I told myself that two years of idleness was a normal growing pattern for a young primate caught up in the cogs of a post-industrial society?

Rationalisation: The less I do, the more I will contribute to the future of pollution-free, unspoiled Australia. Like Hawaii, it will one day realise its potential lies not in coal or uranium or microchips but in pristine beaches, clean water and the quaint atmosphere of a cultural and industrial backwater.

Displacement: My reading of irrelevant or even harmful books such as Spengler's The Decline of the West, my incessant fiddling with my stereo gear and my continuous preoccupation with members of the opposite sex.

Projection: It is this workaholic society that is at fault. Although productivity has increased more than a hundredfold in the past 50 or so years, we are slaving not less but more under the guise of the "leisure society". Introjection: Industrial pollution and genetic damage have affected my auto-immune system irreparably. I am chronically allergic to gasoline smells, air-conditioned environments and bosses with loud voices.

Identification: Many prominent artists and writers of the past were supported by wealthy patrons during their formative years (which in our neoteric times could be anything between 15 and 65). The destitute van Gogh ultimately created employment for thousands of museum curators, art critics, buyers and forgers.

For a while, I was stuck in a no-exit situation. Like Beckett's Vladimir, I was waiting for Godot. The only predictable thing in my life was the arrival of the dole cheque and the absolute inanity of my interviews at the dole office.

Last time they tried to send me for an interview at a paint factory, which they linked somehow to my "artistic tendencies". The foreman had one look at me and nearly split his Stubbies with laughter. He said he'd call me when he needed a model for their next ad showing a young man spilling a can of paint all over himself while trying to renovate the interior of a ferries’ wheel.

When I tried to sell paintings door to door, I was first bitten by a rabid dog and then robbed of my takings by two drunken hoodlums. My career as a freelance photographer in clubs and restaurants ended when an irate customer who was dining with his mistress tried to smash my expensive gear. In desperation, I took to the streets, trying to sell on commission little wooden deer that had massaging wheels instead of legs. My family and friends have now the most pliable backs in the southern hemisphere, and I still have a boxful of the wretched critters under the house.

It was plain that I needed to see a therapist. My father insisted I see a certain Dr Sloboff who once cured a trapeze artist of fear of heights. Sloboff told me that the latest American treatment for work phobias involved combining relaxation, visualisation and affirmation together with systematic desensitisation. In simple terms, I had to put myself into a meditative state, visualise a successful job situation, and then boost the therapeutic effect by repeating to myself a phrase such as that of Thomas Carlyle: "All work is noble; work alone is noble." Then I had to be gradually exposed to the work environment so that the habitual "fight and flight" response would not be activated.

I had no difficulty in eliciting the relaxation response necessary for the successful visualisation. All I had to do was to see myself at the beach on a bright Monday morning, the air warm and full of fragrance enveloping my seminaked body. But then the problems started.

WHETHER I saw myself as a successful merchant banker or a computer salesman, the image would soon get blotted out by the outline of some unknown but irresistible modern Aphrodite. The subsequent affirmation stage would also get mixed up. Instead of the pious words of Carlyle, I would hear myself quoting the blasphemous pronouncements of a certain Joe Hill, an American poet who could be called the guardian angel of the workaphobic: You will eat bye and bye In the glorious land above the sky; Work and pray, Live on hay, You'll get pie in the sky, When you die.

As to the next stage, the sort of job situation I thought I would find relatively non-threatening was as a masseur in Hollywood, or a nature guide at the Top End whose job was to protect visiting American starlets from being ravaged by crocodiles.

Needless to say, Sloboff was very disappointed by my progress. He told my father that my work phobia seemed to be unusually resistant. He recommended flogging, cancellation of my gift subscription to Australian Playboy, and, if symptoms persisted, removal to the "work-for-dole" colony for the unemployed being secretly planned by the Howard Government.

Frankly, I think Sloboff is a total waste of time. But my visits to him gave me an idea. I am setting up a shop in Sydney, manufacturing relaxation and visualisation tapes for the unemployed. I reckon I'm tapping into a real growth area. Wanna buy some shares?

Editor: Pyotr Patrushev’s books and articles can be found on his website, www.russiantranslate.org

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