Tenth of December

“Exhortation” is written as an office memo by Divisional Director Todd Birnie to his staff. He addresses what he sees as negativity about the work, comparing it to cleaning a shelf and saying that “the ‘shelf’ is going to be cleaned […] either by you or the guy who replaces you” (83). He further compares their work to lifting a dead whale carcass, revealing that he and his sons had been involved in such a task while on Reston Island; the work became much easier when a former Marine pumped them up about the importance of the task.

Todd wants his employees to cut back on complaining about work, suggesting that the time to do so is past and reminding them of when a colleague, Andy, doubled his usual number of units; to Todd, this is remarkable in and of itself, despite the unclear moral implications of their unspecified work, which involves “cleanup towels.” Todd implies Andy’s performance that month should make the other employees envious and speculates it has to do with having a child; Todd does not monitor Andy’s numbers closely any more, despite the fact that they have fallen off. Andy has become depressed, and others may be paying attention to his reduced performance, about which Todd might call Andy’s wife.

Todd argues that Andy’s attitude does not change what he did in Room 6 to achieve such high numbers, and admits that what they are asked to do in Room 6 “can be a bummer” (87). However, the numbers cannot go down and the employees only hurt themselves with their poor attitudes. Todd claims to have raised the issue of morale at the Sectional Meeting, which was met with silence. His superior reminded him that if his team did not clean their “shelf” they might end up on the “shelf.” Todd encourages his employees to speak to him if they have any doubts about their work and assures them that the conversation will remain private.