Wednesday
I began writing today’s post in the hospital where Julia is undergoing carpal tunnel surgery. She was first visited by the surgeon, a grandfatherly sort with a great sense of humor who walked her through the forms she needed to sign. At one point he joked that the paperwork was more complex than the surgery itself.
His remarks resonated as we have been listening to one of Terry Pratchett’s Commander Vimes novels, where police grumbling about paperwork is a running joke. Julia and I didn’t mind because we understand that we live in a litigious society where responsibilities need to be laid out, and the doctor was very clear about where his own accountability lay. “If nerve damage results,” he said at one point, “that’s on me and I’ll come back and work to fix it.”
This was in stark contrast to what we had just heard on a Rachel Maddow report on ICE killings and beatings. (Along with Pratchett, we had been listening to the podcast of Monday night’s show.) Although Maine’s governor and two senators have been calling for a complete and thorough independent investigation of an ICE killing in Biddeford, Maine—a resident with a legal work permit is the victim—the site is not being treated as a crime scene. As a result, independent citizens have been taking it upon themselves to photograph the pools of blood. Meanwhile, after months of delay Minnesota investigators are finally gaining access of the evidence surrounding the killings of Rene Goode and Alex Pretti. ICE has been doing all it can to evade accountable paper work.
In Pratchett’s Fifth Elephant, Commander of the Watch Sam Vines has been called out of the city to conduct a diplomatic mission, and Captain Carrot, his ultra-competent second-in-command, has resigned to go in search of his fellow officer Angua, who is his love interest. This leaves in charge the incompetent Sergeant Colon, who has a vexed relationship to paperwork. We learn this early from a conversation he has with Corporal Nobby Nobbs:
“I can see this is going to get on top of me,” said Colon, as they walked away. “There’s paperwork, too. You know me and paper work, Nobby.”
“You’re a very thorough reader, that’s all, Fred,” said Nobby. “I’ve seen you take ages over just one page. Digesting it magisterially, I thought.”
Colon brightened a little. “Yes, that’s what I do,” he said.
“Even if it’s only the menu down at the Klatchian take-out. I’ve seen you staring at one line for a minute at a time.”
“Well, obviously you can’t let people put one over on you, said Colon, sticking out his chest, or at least sticking it further up.
Despite his supposed thoroughness, Colon is overwhelmed by paperwork when he becomes acting commander. It occurs to him
that maybe Vimes and Carrot between them had developed a way of keeping just ahead of the piles, by knowing what was important and what wasn’t. To Colon, it was all gut-wrenchingly mysterious. There were complaints, and memos, and invitations, and letters requesting “a few minutes of your time” and forms to fill in, and reports to read, and sentences containing words like “iniquitous” and “immediate action” and they tottered in his mind like a great big wave, poised to fall on him.
Pratchett observes that Colon is so far out of his depth that “the fish had lights on their noses.” The author explains,
It wasn’t that he was illiterate, but Fred Colon did need a bit of think and a run-up to tackle anything much longer than a list and he tended to get lost in any word that had more than three syllables. He was, in fact, functionally literate. That is, he thought of reading and writing like he thought about boots—you needed them, but they weren’t supposed to be fun, and you got suspicious about people who got a kick out of them.
Colon is finally able solve his paperwork problem by making a simple connection:
He turned, and his eye caught the huge accusing heap of paperwork in the corner.
And the empty fireplace, too.
That was what officering was all about, wasn’t it? Making decisions!
Unfortunately, the decision that results in a clean desk also leads him to burn the wages chitty, which means that no one gets paid and everyone leaves the force. Railing against paper work is like railing against government regulations: while they can seem onerous, often they serve a function.
Pratchett’s novel has a lot more to say about the impulse to abuse power and about the responsibility of police to resist going over to the dark side. But I’ve been up since 5:30 this morning so I’ll save that for another day.
More Pratchett on paperwork:
Paperwork is also a running joke in Jingo, where it is Vimes struggling with it. I particularly like this passage:
Vimes’s desk was becoming famous. Once there were piles, but they had slipped as piles do, forming this dense compacted layer that was now turning into something like peat. It was said there were plates and unfinished meals somewhere down there. No one wanted to check. Some people said they’d heard movement.
And then there’s this one:
Vimes’s approach to paperwork was not to touch it until someone was shouting, and then at least there would be someone to help him sort through the stacks.
