"the world"

Ah, but "the world" is a royal torture at times...At work with spies and ambitious plotters and capricious arrogant stupid kings, the only place a simple soul can be happy is sitting on a bench outside with the wind and the sound of birds in the trees. Maybe I'm too simple, with country naivete running through my middle like "blackpool" runs through a stick of rock; maybe I'm too delicate emotionally, with the resilience of a spoiled infant-- but I just can't take all the backbiting, all the competition, the plotting against one another, and the sudden changes of weather in your relationships, someone who loves you suddenly hating you for no reason you can determine. Makes me want to hit all of 'em with a frying pan and head out for the country--except I have to spend large chunks of my time in the place and if I escape to save my sanity I'll lose my job. I used to say what I thought to my colleagues because I believe in the twin sisters of Honesty and Trust. But everything I said was reported to the boss. Now I cut short every conversation about work characters or policies with everybody, even if they present themselves as someone I can trust, by calling on a favourite old English saying: "Least said, soonest mended." This too is interpreted, in the cynical world of work, as some kind of game I'm playing. But it's just the last defence of someone who seriously needs to get away.