Who is Dax Movenhaven?

My name is Matthew Fischer, and I first met Dax Movenhaven years ago while working as an office assistant. I won’t say I had the ‘pleasure’ of making his acquaintance. I’m not sure anyone would say that about their first encounter with Dax. Or many of the encounters after that either. Dax wasn’t one for pleasantries. He wasn’t always easy to know, but I will say, knowing him impacted my life greatly. I won’t claim to have always understood him, but I could tell from the first time I met him, he was a man of immense personality, even if that personality was grating at times.

Dax was a Sales and Marketing Assistant, and his job was primarily making sales calls, although some days it could seem as if his one and only responsibility was to take coffee breaks. I’m not sure I ever saw him actually pick up a phone. The man hated phones and he hated phone calls. 

Strange choice of career when you consider that. But that was Dax. There was always something else going on just below the surface and you were never sure just what it was. It might seem like indifference, or it could seem like depth. He was well-educated, so apparently he was intelligent, but lacked all conventional social skills. It might seem like he wasn’t listening to you at all, and then he’d give the most brutally honest piece of advice you’d ever receive.

I’m not sure we were actually friends. I’m not sure he had any friends. But he did complain to me, not about me, so that probably meant something. I’d like to think I passed his silent tests and that I was a confidant of some sort. If I was, he never said the words out loud. I can only judge him by his actions towards me.

Dax titled himself “Bitter and Jaded,” not me. I, for one, am not totally convinced that he was in fact “Bitter and Jaded.” At least not in the angry, disgruntled, evil sense. Sure, he could be rude and ruthless. He was easily annoyed. He always seemed tired. Sure. But I don’t think he was a pessimist or a misanthrope. I think he saw what the world could have been, should have been, and I think seeing the reality of life, the mundane repetition that came with a regular desk job, broke something inside his spirit. He didn’t know how to reconcile what he saw and what he wanted. The people around him just weren’t enough. He couldn’t bring himself to care about gossip or pop culture or pretty much anything that consisted of normal human interaction. I think his expectations were too high, and he broke his own heart a little bit by wishing and dreaming for far too much.

Dax was tough to know, but he was never boring. I’m glad I met him. I’m glad he shared his story with me. I hope he’s okay. I hope he’s out there, somewhere right now, drinking a cup of coffee and dispensing his version of wisdom and the harsh truths of reality that so many of us would simply rather ignore.

Godspeed, Dax Movenhaven. And may the truth be the wind at your back. That, and a good stiff cup of coffee.