Haresh Shah
A Touch Of Communism In The Capitalist Culture
In the fall of 1989 over the weekend of October, 6/8, Carolyn and I went to the Duneland Beach Inn in Michigan City, Indiana and returned with an agreement that the best course of action for us as individuals – to use the corporate cliché, going forward, was for us to go our own way. Not even a tiny blip on the world stage. That very weekend on October 7, Hungary becomes independent and on October 23rd, the acting President, Mátyás Szűrös declares the country a Republic in the public ceremony held in the same Kossuth Square where the first mass rally of the 1956 revolution was held. The historic moment for which I happened to be in Budapest and along with the Hungarian editors, would go to the square to hear the declaration proclaimed. We come back to the office and begin to put together the first issue of Playboy to come out a month later – the first of the three I would launch behind the iron curtain. On November 4, I turn 50 with a big fanfare and the nine liter Salamanzar bottle of Lanson champagne, compliment of my boss and the friend Bill (Stokkan). The Berlin Wall falls on November 9th, the Velvet Revolution unfolds on Národní třída in Prague on November 17th, and in-between on the weekend of October 14/15, Playboy headquarters in Chicago move some three plus blocks south east to 680 N. Lake Shore Drive from it’s imposing skyline presence at 919 N. Michigan Avenue. The Bunny Beacon that illuminated the Chicago skies for 23 years, is no longer and neither are the floor high letters PLAYBOY, lit bright.
I am not even in the town when the big move happens. Thanks to my most able and the efficient assistant Mary (Nastos) that I am moved into my new office and when I walk in a couple of weeks later, other than a few unopened boxes, Mary has found the new home for my stuff in a very organized way in the space I would occupy for the next four years. The office I have yet to see.
I park my car in the same building instead of a block away in a separate parking garage. I take the elevator first down to the lobby and switch to the one which would take me to the Playboy’s new headquarters on the 15th floor. I am dazzled by the cascade of natural and artificial light, the high ceiling and the U shaped railing up above, looking down at the receptionist a floor down below. Mounted on the wall on the west side of the reception area is a huge bronze sculpture of Playboy’s familiar Rabbit Head blinking at me with its left eye. Commissioned and created by the renowned Chicago sculptor, Richard Hunt. On the opposite side, in front of an expansive glass wall sits a slender, exotic looking dark skinned, very sweet and petite young woman, I have never seen before.
‘May I help you?’ She flashes a friendly smile, which is unconsciously seductive, her voice dripping with honey.
‘Oh yes! I am here – ur, I guess I work here!’
Soon I see in the background Mary coming down the steps of one of the two Terrazzo staircases. At the first glance I perceive them to be to be twin modernistic Spanish steps descending on to the either side of Piazza di Spagna in Rome. I see Mary rush towards the glass wall and yanking open the door on the side.
‘Welcome back,’ she gives me a hearty hug as the receptionist looks on.
‘Mona, meet my boss Haresh Shah.’ Mary introduces me to the receptionist and takes me by the hand. ‘Let me take you to your new office.’
I am in awe of what I see as we approach the atrium. Instead of little shops and the stands found on a Piazza, I am face-to-face with a large oil on canvas portrait of Gloria Steinem, done by Chicago artist Ed Paschke, mounted on one of the panels, staring menacingly at me through her magenta colored glasses. Up the stairs on the wall facing us, I see a pair of giant red lips by Tom Wesselman, open wide in a hearty laugh, a set of perfectly aligned teeth sparkling. I also glance up at the slanted modernistic metal canopies crowning the glass walls. The executive offices. Mary informs me, about what would come to be known as the fish tank. As we stop at the top of the floor, there is an office on my right, That’s John Mastro’s office. And the right outside begins the grey Steele railing that stretches over the expanse of the atrium, curved like the shape of a luxury liner. Stunning!
Turning the curve, Mary leads me to the section behind the lips; assigned to our group. Suddenly I am in the different world away from the glitz and the glamour of the areas surrounding the atrium and the executive offices. It’s a large square space. Clustered in the middle are the work stations, mostly in blue with grey trimming. While most of the support staff sat outside the offices of their bosses at 919, here they each have their own work stations, separated by about six feet high soft padded partitioned walls. Over there is Bill’s office. She points to the closed door across what I will call the bullpen. And then there are other offices like fortresses to the support staff. This is where I sit, right outside of your office. She opens the closed door on her right, turns on the lights and lets me in.
I pause and stand at the threshold of my office and take it in. The floor is covered with bright royal blue soft padded rug, The bright white, perhaps 5000 Kelvin fluorescent tubes filtered through the chrome slated fixtures flood the room. I am pleased that at long last, I’ve gotten the larger desk, the kind I had always wanted but never had an office big enough to justify having one. Unlike the beige marble desk top, this one has speckled black granite top. The base is the same with the filing and storage cabinets built-in as before, because it’s one of the same desks refurbished, in that instead of the natural oak stain, it is now painted black. It is flushed against the sidewall made up of the bright blue padded panels. Behind the desk is wall-to-wall credenza – something I really love. A side of the desks had always been a small credenza meant for typewriters. Which alas would become too small just in a year or so to accommodate desk top computers. The chairs too are the same, reupholstered and covered also with different fabric – now with either solid black or small black and grey pattern. On my right is a granite topped conference table, which is larger in diameter than the one I had. But no couch for lounging during the meeting breaks.
Who got how big of an office and in which area and how each one of them would be furnished was determined by our corporate titles and the numeric personnel classifications. To be fair to everyone, a system had to be devised. It had to be just and egalitarian or at least to fit within our boss Bill’s definition of some people being more equal than others. Since there wasn’t going to be any natural light in our windowless offices, it became important to spruce up their interior dressing. Something we could choose. Sort of. So Sue Shoemaker, the Director of Corporate Administrative Services, stops by to see each one of us in advance of the big move.
‘What color wall paneling you like?’ Now the dirty brown cork walls to be replaced with the padded and fabric covered panels, to be used as before as our wall-to-wall bulletin boards. The choice was between bright red and royal blue. I chose royal blue. Though I would get a larger desk, I had to choose between either a mini conference table and/or the couch.
‘I would like to have both!’
‘You can only have one or the other.’
‘I do have both of them right now.’
‘So I see. But with your position with the company, you’re entitled to only one of them.’
‘That’s new to me, but for what I do, I have a need for both of them. We have meetings all day long and it just makes it nicer to have a bit more relaxing couch when we break.’
‘Sorry, but we had to draw a line somewhere and only the Sr. VPs and above get both.’ I was only a VP.
What when and if I am promoted to be a Sr. VP? I want to ask, but stop short. Perhaps not a good omen. As it turns out, I am indeed promoted to be the senior VP within six months, but then the office I am assigned to is not big enough to accommodate both, and there is no provision for the expansion. Grudgingly, I accept what’s given to me.
‘Do you like your new office?’ Mary chirps.
‘I guess!’ She knows what I am thinking.
‘Well, I leave you alone to catch up with things. Welcome back again.’ And she closes the door behind her, leaving me feeling like a prisoner being lead to his cell and the door closed behind him. Feeling dismayed at not even a sliver of natural light peeking through, I try to forget it and settle myself at my new desk, pick up the piles of paper prioritized by Mary and begin with reading faxes that needed my immediate attention. The day slips by fast. Most everyone has left for the day, including Mary, leaving me behind still trying to catch up. Now with no need to keep the door closed, I am able to see out at the work stations outside. Even see a bit of the window at the farthest side of the hall, beyond which is Chicago’s pride and joy, Lake Michigan. The forbidden fruit for us.
When done for the day, I pack up and turn off the lights in my office. Suddenly its pitch dark in there, except for a bit of the light from the bullpen crossing in. On impulse, I put down my briefcase on the floor, enter back my office and shut the door. Never thought anything can be so dark. It feels like a cave with no opening. Closed in like a tomb. I hastily make my escape, and stop outside to look around at the exterior. While the atrium and other public areas and the conference rooms and the employee lounge are plastered with some of the magazine’s best art, none of the walls of our group have anything on their sterile white surfaces.
I approach Sue.
‘How about some artworks for our area?’
‘Its planned, but we just haven’t gotten around to it.’
‘How if I put up our own magazine covers that I had framed and hung outside our offices at 919?’
‘You can’t do that.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because everything has to be coordinated and in graphic harmony. I will talk to Tom (Staebler) (the art director) about it.’
Nothing for another couple of months. Either Tom didn’t have time or didn’t think we were important enough to deserve some of his fine illustrations. Or the discussion between Sue and Tom never took place.
I broach the subject one more time and insist that what I really would like to do is for us to have our own identity and since I have already had those framed covers in my storage, why don’t I hang them up? If Tom comes up with something, we can always take them down.
‘Let me think about it!’ So she does. Still nothing. But I don’t let go and basically wear Sue out.
‘Okay, when Bill (the company carpenter) has some extra time, I will ask him to stop by and hang them up for you.’ That is almost like never.
‘I can do that myself!’
‘No, no, no. Its not your job. Should something happen, insurance doesn’t cover that.’
I want to scream, but instead say: ‘Well okay. Will wait for Bill to come by. Thanks’ And watch her turn her back and walk back to her office. I spend some time outside my office and scope the wall space I have and try to figure out how I can best display the framed covers on the walls available to me.
The next evening, its past six when I am certain that almost everybody is gone home, especially Sue, I pull out my measure tape, pencil, nails and the hammer that I have brought along from home. An hour and a half later, they are all adoring the International Publishing walls and suddenly those sterile looking white walls seem to have acquired colors on their anemic cheeks. I leave with a smile of satisfaction on my lips.
Late next morning, I see Sue walking past my office, stop and take in what I had done, I am not sure she even cared to look inside my office, but I see her shaking her head before walking away.
© Haresh Shah 2013
Illustration: Celia Rose Mark
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