You ever notice how people only see what they wanna see? And you can be jumpin’ up and down and yelling the truth right in people’s face, but they just see what they wanna see, you know? I was saying this to Mickey in HR the other day, trying to ease into it gradual-like, but he started talking about the mainstream media and alternate voices and all that, so I just gave up. I’ll try again some other time.

Hmm. I guess before I get too far ahead of myself I should probably mention, I’m a gorilla.

Now there isn’t any law or regulation or anything that says you can’t hire a gorilla, so I don’t think anyone’s gonna get in trouble, but I’m still a little nervous about coming out, so to speak. I’ve tried dropping hints like leaving my lunchbox sitting open so you could see it’s full of leaves or putting a photo on my desk with me and my folks on vacation with my much smaller human wife and her parents. Seems to me the difference is pretty clear, but no one seems to notice. They just ask me how I liked Aruba. It was nice! Not humid like you’d think.

My wife asks me, “Why don’t you just go in and tell them you’re a gorilla?” She doesn’t get it. It’s not as simple as that. I’ve been there for four years and everyone just assumed I’m a human. If I go in and say I’m a whole ‘nother genus, let alone species, they’re liable to get upset, like I was trying to deceive them or something. They’ll say I was lying by omission, but it’s not like there’s a box on the insurance forms where you check off human, gorilla, chimpanzee, or bonobo.

It also might affect Larry in shipping. He’s a gorilla, too, but he’s still pretty jungle, you know? Good at lifting stuff, but never really cracked a book. If I start talking about gorilla stuff, they might point at him and say gorillas are too dangerous and unrefined and whatnot. You can say we’re 98% genetically similar til you’re blue in the face, but it’s there, you know? They’re not actively bigoted against gorillas, but I think it’s in the back of their heads somewhere.

They sometimes make comments about bananas or something. I don’t think they mean to; I think it’s subconcious-like. Still bums me out, though. I mean, I’m working late trying to finish up some CL reports and someone asks me outta nowhere if I know sign language. It ain’t cool. I oughta just tell ’em and put it out in the open.

That’s what I’ll do. We got a planning session tomorrow and I’m gonna stand up and tell ’em that they’re working with a gorilla and that’s okay. And if they try any of that species-ist stuff about Larry, I’ll say yep, AND he’s the one who’s been embezzling the last two years. Gorilla or not, I’m not losing my Aruba money for that lummox.