Managing Topics

Because work involves producing things, it takes place within fixed boundaries. Not only is it tied to a specific neighborhood, employer, or industrial quarter, it is time-bound and regulated by hours and weeks. Careers, by contrast, tend to be loosened from the constraints of space and time. People who have careers are prepared to move anywhere in search of the next stage, either within the firm or within the country. They are not, however, prepared to punch a clock. Process, not output, counts as the measure of success. Those who pursue careers manage rather than produce. Indeed, one of the things they devote a great deal of time to managing is the transition to an economy that produces less.
—Alan Wolfe, U.S. sociologist, educator. “Middle Class Moralities,” Wilson Quarterly (Summer 1993)

As it was cold, I collected quite a pile of wood and lay down on a board against the side of the building, not having any blanket to cover me, with my head to the fire, that I might look after it, which is not the Indian rule. But as it grew colder towards midnight, I at length encased myself completely in boards, managing even to put a board on top of me, with a large stone on it, to keep it down, and so slept comfortably. I was reminded, it is true, of the Irish children, who inquired what their neighbors did who had no door to put over them in winter nights as they had; but I am convinced that there was nothing very strange in the inquiry. Those who have never tried it can have no idea how far a door, which keeps the single blanket down, may go toward making one comfortable.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)