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I didn’t agree with the protagonist, whose lack of initiative and inability to focus his attention and get his act together was the sole cause of his discontent.

For me, the line "I can't do what ten people tell me to do" spoke to me. If you have ever had a dotted line on the org chart to more than one supervisor at a time, you might know what I mean. And these days, he would have had the problem of sittin' at the dock of the bay, surrounded by human feces.

For me, the line "I can't do what ten people tell me to do" spoke to me. If you have ever had a dotted line on the org chart to more than one supervisor at a time, you might know what I mean.

Yes, that's a perspective definitely worth considering. I do volunteer work for just such an organization which is run by a federal agency combined with a private foundation, and I've seen some of those in positions of leadership undergo personality changes as a result of the stress of having to serve two masters which are often at loggerheads. Perhaps the man sitting on the dock is suffering burnout from being caught up in too many bureaucratic power struggles.