Indigestion

My assessment on Mass Dining

Slivered shreds of Roast Beef, stubby oil-chaffed potato wedges, a mop of soggy vegetables, and a gloss of muddy diane spillage, looking up with glum invitation to an already mirrored expression, poised with a fork.
It's dinner time at the Mess, and as a matter of deconstructed precision, the plates full and the fork turns and nobody notices.
I vacantly pilot the contents upon my plate to where jaw muscles instinctively work in rhythmic procession to the subliminal hubbub of chit-chat, metallic TV babble, clanging cutlery, and jets of steam flushed cooking equipment beyond my realm of attention that the tastlessness of what I am gorging becomes another blur amongst the transient atmosphere I am metaphorically alien to. On I chew.
Maybe 50, or 60 people churning slowly in and out of seats with meals and empty plates as the nightly ritual unravels as a prelude to TV boredom with slumber-enhanced sub-entertaining yawns teetering onto downy velvet-time, as clockwork requires. Predictaramia.
A sea of predominantly naval orange vested shift workers with white caps of discordant civilian mufti attire set upon a backdrop of shiny buffeted-top and pastel sky coloured interior kitchen decor, becomes the postcard greet through the creaky swinging entrance doors. The mural of our dining experience.
The airconditioning is set to simulate mid-June Melbourne weather, which in turn vanquishes a necessity to pursue the soup bowls on inquisition, and a slight arousal of an under-alerted time-table driven schedule to feed oneself. The banquet would be much appreciated I'm sure if in a more relaxing and less traffic-jammed experience rather than a mass feed cooperation prodded onward as a means of necessity.
I stabbed at the remaining chippers of wedges and trowelled through the smears of remnant diane in continued melodramatic fashion to promote my deed to the Mass procession. Tasty but missing the magic touch of a seasoned chef, not a shift-working remote-charmed alarcarte cook whose obsession with quantity levers the gaps where quality escapes. But then I guess the ensuing workplace and living conditions do have an opinion that renders the mind powerless in complience, a necessity for those who know no better and those slipping back to a comfortable rung.
I breathed in shallowly before exerting a deeper push while leaning my knife arm back to a relaxed holster position, pushing my plate aside, to exclaim my defeat at the hands of my now vanquished melancholy banquet. Yes, over-ate again, another example of quality under quantity, indulgence over moderation, and aquirement over requirement, a vortex that only humans know and recognise but still trip and fall head on into.
The hubbub continues.
I leave the Mess.
I am full yet hungry.