You know how you sometimes get a song stuck in your head, and no matter how hard you try, you just can’t get rid of it? That’s been happening to me today, except instead of a song, I have the same movie scene running continual loops in my brain. The scene is from the original movie Jaws.

For me, working in corporate communications was a little like being the only sober person at a wild party. You learn a lot about what’s really going on behind people’s carefully scripted public personas when you sit on the sidelines watching them get falling-down drunk. And since I had no desire to climb the corporate ladder, my experience in Big Business was equally eye-opening. My long-term ambition was always to become a freelance writer. So with no personal stake in the game of jockeying for position, I was more or less free to sit back and watch the political maneuvering.

British agent James Bond lies strapped to a table as master criminal Goldfinger’s laser beam slowly inches forward, threatening to slice him in half lengthwise. “Do you expect me to talk?” Bond asks. Goldfinger laughs. “No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die.”