As I said in a previous part: fighting against the ‘non-firing firing’ was useless. They wanted you gone and they will make your life miserable until you leave. As you stand outside it, you can be objective and think ‘Oh, that poor person! Why don’t they just walk?” I’ve always believed in justice. Unfairness gets to me. I think comes from being a little brother. When my older brother Charlie put my head into a wall my mother did punish him but told me I should have just stayed away from him. Being smaller and weaker I didn’t have much say. So I fought back, even when I got my butt kicked. Which I did. A lot.

The announcement came again, “Tom Stewart, please report to the managing director’s office.” SCT never used that system, except for emergencies. I had told them I wasn’t coming. It was past my shift and I had been warned that if I stayed one second past my shift there would be “consequences”.

Up until a few years ago I had a couple little two-drawer filing cabinets. Inside one was a very thick file of correspondence, emails, memos all relating to those last two years. It wascouple inches thick and heavy. I had gathered all the material as it happened or after the fact, building up the file and adding to it; letters from the labor relations board, memos to me from the managing director, printed out emails supporting me from HR, others condemning me from various admin personal (couple that were sent to me accidently). Like I said, it was heavy in terms of weight and emotion.

Ah, how young I looked! Well, younger than I am now for sure. The photo was taken in May of 2002. I was in a western bib shirt phase and this is just one of them. This one was a bit itchy. I have my hand up, and Batman watch on and mouth open. I am pretending to yell. Normally I would have actually yelled, and I did but the photographer missed it. So, I faked it and he got a nice shot for the Sunday paper. Yes, this photo was published in the Sunday Seattle Times along with a very nice article on me by Times feature columnist Nichole Brodeur. Full color, below the fold on the Arts section. Now why would someone want to take my picture in such a pose? That is the odd tale I’m telling today. It really begins though a few years before 2002…