The Incompetent PM

The incompetent PM was talking. In any meeting to which he was invited he would always do most of the talking. In this way he ensured the conversation did not stray onto topics of which he was ignorant, or which he did not understand. For this reason none of the meetings he attended ever got round to discussing anything of any importance and seldom achieved any purpose. He was universally dis-liked, held in the lowest regard and held explicitly responsible for the department's dysfunction, its incapability and its paralysis. What he lacked in self-awareness, he made up for in misplaced, bullying confidence. And volume. I saw my colleagues look to their blank pages in front of them, trying to listen to what the incompetent PM was saying. I was wishing he could leave so the matter in hand could be discussed and a concrete decision and plan of action achieved. But the incompetent PM was holding court, and the hour would be fully consumed by his filibustering. We would have to stumble on with the same problem for yet another month. Five still blank notepads closed, and five pens were quietly laid down.

When I was 18 I saw my first real mountain. I had of course seen and walked the gentle rounded sugar-loaves of Wales and England, but I was unprepared for the sheer massive presence of the mountains I encountered in Italy. We were travelling from Milan to Trento in the north of the country, and the train seemed to come across the mountain quite suddenly; I had no awareness of any gentle rise, no climbing of foothills easing me to the mountain base - just a sudden sheer physical presence of immovable, implacable rock suddenly, and irrefutably there - a gentle stone's throw from the train. The light was instantly obscured from my window, my vision was suddenly dominated by cold, grey, silvering granite. Although the mountain was huge and visible for miles, and the train was filled with people, this encounter felt to me to be a very intimate moment  - a rapture imposed on me by a rock, unexpected and uninvited; maybe this was the first time the true grandeur of our world had impinged on my emotions. I felt my eyes had been opened and my perceptions changed forever.

The incompetent PM was one of those people you hear about but like to believe do not truly exist. He had achieved a position of importance by being consistently bad at a succession of roles.  Manager after manager had promoted him on the basis that it would be easier to elevate him out of a position where he was doing harm, than to remove him entirely from the organization he had worked for, for so very long. As a result, if there was one thing the incompetent PM had learned from his time in The Company it was impatience. He had now been doing harm in his current role for nearly two years. He felt a promotion was due, and was trying hard to make a mark. He was acutely aware that promotions come from impressing those above you, and not from appeasing those below. Therefore he treated his superiors with obsequious deference, and his inferiors with a cold, indifferent contempt. He enjoyed the drama of sacking people below him, and found reasons to do so often.

In that same holiday in Italy we were guided to the top of the mountains by my friend's uncle - a Tyrolean farmer who knew the mountains as I know my local high street. We travelled in a group of about twelve, all young, all fit. The first part of the walk through the forested foothills was memorable for no more than the good company of friends happy in each other's company and enjoying the novelty of being out in a cold, nose-numbing morning air. We circled the mountain base in a friendly spirit of comradery and banter. As we crossed the barren area midway up the mountain, above the trees but below the peaks, the sun made its presence felt, and I, with my pasty Irish complexion was grateful for the periods of walking the steep slopes in the cool shade of the mountain above. The peaks were made accessible to non-mountaineers by a series of ladders, bolted to the sheer cliff faces; we tied ropes to our torsos, with karabiners at the ends that we would snap on to each rung as we ascended. The exposure of the climb was exhilarating, the ladders were long and took us over sheer drops with suspended cloud beneath us. As we climbed higher, distractions fell away one by one - vegetation, birdsong, heat from the sun; we were left with the rock, the wind and the feeling of our own straining heartbeats. Conversation all but stopped as we opened our senses to the splendor and strangeness of being high, high above the ordinary cares of man and our own petty concerns.

The incompetent PM was listing the actions from our meeting. He, of course, had none. The rest dutifully made notes, arranged a suitable time for the next meeting the following month, and filed out of the room.

Descending the mountain, our guide was keen to prove his youth and vigor, and, with those who wished to accompany him, elected to take the journey at a jog. He set a not-overly fast pace, but took the steepest angled descents; the burning sensation in my thighs were testament to the strangeness of the exercise to my body. We stopped now and again at flowing brooks and streams to suck thirstily from the surface - the water was fresh and clear, and shocked me with its frigid coldness. By the time we neared the bottom, wet with sweat, and panting with exertion our guide was still keen to prove himself to us - and though I knew I could out-pace him on this last stretch I hung back, not wanting to introduce a sour note to what I knew had been the first day of my real life.

The incompetent PM sat in his office and considered his day. He had asserted himself over his juniors and been decisive and confident. He felt he was providing great inspiration and impetus to achieve, and he regretted that he would not be in his role long enough to see the fruits of his labours come to fruition.

I, the incompetent PM felt I would dearly love to see the mountains again.