Day before yesterday, I sat around the table with some of the family. Just, in passing, I seem to write that a great deal...'I sat around the table with some of the family'...
After we'd eaten, and caught up on the latest news, as seems to be the fashion these days no less than four (4) of us were indulging in a post-prandial scan of our smart phones to be sure that we hadn't missed an email or the latest Facebook post when someone remarked, 'Hey, did you know it was Grandparents Day?'
No one had and except for a few rueful smiles and an apology to my Mom and Stepdad who really are Grandparents, that 'Man, if we'd known, we'd wouldn't have made you cook today!', the matter dropped.
Later, as I drove the 20+ miles home with little to occupy my thoughts but some execrable music (unlike some I haven't been able to make myself pony up for XM Satellite Radio yet) and the antics of my fellow drivers, I had the sudden thought that this was the first time in my life that I had no grandparents left to commemorate. My last surviving grandparent died last December.
As is my wont, I drifted back a bit, thinking about these four personages who gave me my DNA, my fair skin, my tendency toward stubbornness, my love of reading, my extreme dislike of the smell of cooked popcorn (my paternal grandmother), my love of bread and gravy, all of the minutiae that goes into the making of me with all of my attributes and flaws.
It's funny, as I was driving to my Mom's that day, I'd had that sense of deja vu, remembering other Sundays, flying down the interstate in our Volare station wagon on a warm sunny Florida September afternoon to go to Grandma's for an after-church meal. They usually would have returned to Florida from their summer trek to their Ohio home by September. I remember especially loving the month of September because it meant that Grandma and Grandpa would be home. Nothing ever tasted so good as those home-made Sloppy Joe's, always served with soggy potato chips, salad and for some inexplicable reason, Jello. We always had that gelatinous mound of proto-plasm, as an adult I dislike it vehemently, but as a child, I guess I just went with the flow. We'd sit around the table for ages reminiscing and sharing news and stories. 'Yakking' my Grandma always called it. It was the stuff of life for her. Often, we'd still be sitting at that table when Sunday lunch turned to Sunday dinner. It was no problem, out came the leftovers and after that, the lemon bars, seven-layer bars, pistachio cakes, or apple crisp. Seldom, but still notable was the fact that there were a few occasions when we sat even longer and had a second dessert of cookies and heavenly hash ice cream.
I knew that when they came home all of the good stuff would return. Things like taking walks with my Grandma around the Senior Citizen complex they lived in to find petunias, although she called them, 'tunies. Nothing thrilled us more than to see those pastel color flowers with the black faces. And then there was the ritual of 'bumming at the local Mall. I'm never sure if was by accident or by design, but the complex they lived in was one large parking lot walk away from the mall. We'd scramble down the hill that led from the complex to the mall parking lot and then a few more steps to the large glass doors where we'd spend blissful hours walking the mall, bummin', which meant looking in windows, browsing the book shops, the Hallmark store where she bought her boxes of stationary, past the Tiffany Bakery with all of its intoxicating smells, the drugstore for Chicklets and Luden's cough drops, Morrow's Nut House for wax paper bags of pastel non-pariel candies, and then if I'd been good and even some times when I hadn't, I usually netted a mint chip ice cream cone from Baskin Robbins. We rarely bought anything of great value, mostly what Grandma called 'busy work', meaning a coloring book, a packet of Crayolas, a scratch pad. Sometimes I was allowed to have a packet of Starburst candies from the drugstore. Even as an adult, when I chew a Starburst candy, I'm back there, a child, in the drugstore at the mall.
The mall I used to walk with my grandmother still exists, but I rarely go there now. Once, my Mom asked me why, if I go to a mall at all, I never go to that one, "Too many ghosts", I said. When I look across that parking lot on the west side of the mall now, the complex is gone, the pool where I learned to swim lies under the three-story parking garage that adjoins the new multi-plex movie theatre. They demolished the old Twin theater back in the late 80's. Grandma went there for .25 cent movie days on Wednesday mornings.
On occasion, when I feel overwhelmed by life or when I'm ill and broken down in some way, I mentally take that trip in my mind; I'm always amazed at the piercing clarity with which I remember it all. They were such simple pleasures. Just Grandma and I walking the mall and ferreting out treasures.
Bummin...
Tuesday, September 10, 2013
Monday, August 26, 2013
School Days
You know that icky feeling of dread that you get in your stomach when you feel that you may have forgotten something, something really important?
That feeling was coursing through me at about 7:30 a.m. this morning. The Non-Company German contingent were on their way, and I'd forgotten to check whether or not their flown-ahead shipment of tools and supplies were accounted for last week, before Monday rolled around, before the Germans were set to be here. By 8:00 a.m., I'd been to Receiving and finding no crates from Germany, I, well there is no other way to say it,was absolutely 'wigged out, off-the-reservation, out of my mind'. By 8:15 a.m., I was on the phone haranguing some poor girl in the Orlando International Airport for the number for the freight connection of Lufthansa Airlines. At 8:30 a.m., I was on the phone with Lufthansa Freight, pleading with them to tell me that the shipment had made it through customs, wasn't sitting abandoned in some warehouse somewhere, or worse that it hadn't been left for dead out on the tarmac in Dusseldorf. By 10:30 a.m., relieved to find that the shipment had actually made it to Orlando, I'd finally reached the courier where some burnt out guy named Vinnie (and no I am not making this up) with a devil-may-care heavy on the Bronx accent told me that "yeah, we was supposed to deliver on Friday, but it never made it on the truck, so we figgered we'd just ship it today".
"Okay, I said wearily, biting back the epithets I longed to lob at him, "so what's your ETA?" Vinnie considers his words for a moment and says, "well, sometime between now and noon. Youse see nomally we can tell ya if we already loaded the truck, but were still loadin' it, so we can't tell ya exactly when. Prawbly bout' an hour and a haf." Making it, you guessed it... exactly noon.
Then I proceeded to don safety glasses and steel-toed over shoes every 30 minutes to run out to the factory floor and irritate the crew in Receiving to 'check on the status'. In between floor runs, I nearly downloaded a Trojan horse virus by opening a mail I would normally have never opened had I been in my right mind, locked myself out of a Non-Company database by keying in the wrong password repeatedly, banged my shin on an open file drawer and jammed my fingers in my desk drawer.
In between, I mourned, this was my project, the first one I'd really been given the lead on in all my time at Non-Company. I'm letting my new boss down. I should have checked the status on Friday. Why didn't I check the status on Friday?
So what does this all have to do with school....
At one point today, in a lull between phone calls, between catastrophes, I saw my mobile phone blinking. A strobing blue light, which says hey, you have a message, an email, an update. In this case a Facebook update. So I stole a moment away, strolled through my News Feed, and there I saw a photograph of my friends' daughter. Actually, the friend who was my best friend all through my adolescence, my school years. It was her daughter, all dressed up, first day of school. Fifth Grade. There were several photos. In fact, it appeared to be somewhat of an occasion, pictures with her Dad and sister, with her grandparents, walking to the bus, boarding the bus, her new backpack slung over her shoulder, new lunchbox in her hand. I once knew her grandparents well; growing up they were like a second family to me.
Looking at the pictures, it called back so many memories, this friend and I met at her daughter's age now. With about a six-month age gap between us, she would have been heading off to 4th grade and me to the 5th. But we always walked to the bus stop together. Away from school we were inseparable, the best of friends. Always passing notes, having sleepovers at each other's homes, talking on the phone until all hours. BFF's forever.
I felt hollow inside. We're Facebook friends but not friends in the way we were. Time, distance and different lifestyles have separated us. While I was wigging out at work, trying to solve my crisis, she was experiencing a milestone moment, putting her daughter on the bus. In a few weeks, I'll have mostly forgotten about today's crises, five months from now I won't remember it all, but she'll always have this day to remember. In younger days, we were so sure we'd always be friends, that we'd stay in the same place, that our kids would be friends. Sometimes it seems so implausible that I sit here, edging nearer to 40, and have no children, no spouse. A demanding job that seems to take up every moment of my life, my thoughts...my energy.
I still cherish a photo of us, well, the four of us, she and I, and my younger sister and her younger brother...we were quite a crew. And now...scattered, different states, different lives, all of them with children, she has 2, her brother 2, my sister 3, and me well....0. Sometimes I find it so hard to believe it turned out this way.
I've always believed in the core of my being, that God doesn't make mistakes, that our lives are as he would have us to be. But sometimes, a smaller, inner part of me wonders, was it God choosing this life or me refusing to be braver, to take more risks with my heart?
And every so often, at this time of year, I wish I were putting my kid on the bus.
That feeling was coursing through me at about 7:30 a.m. this morning. The Non-Company German contingent were on their way, and I'd forgotten to check whether or not their flown-ahead shipment of tools and supplies were accounted for last week, before Monday rolled around, before the Germans were set to be here. By 8:00 a.m., I'd been to Receiving and finding no crates from Germany, I, well there is no other way to say it,was absolutely 'wigged out, off-the-reservation, out of my mind'. By 8:15 a.m., I was on the phone haranguing some poor girl in the Orlando International Airport for the number for the freight connection of Lufthansa Airlines. At 8:30 a.m., I was on the phone with Lufthansa Freight, pleading with them to tell me that the shipment had made it through customs, wasn't sitting abandoned in some warehouse somewhere, or worse that it hadn't been left for dead out on the tarmac in Dusseldorf. By 10:30 a.m., relieved to find that the shipment had actually made it to Orlando, I'd finally reached the courier where some burnt out guy named Vinnie (and no I am not making this up) with a devil-may-care heavy on the Bronx accent told me that "yeah, we was supposed to deliver on Friday, but it never made it on the truck, so we figgered we'd just ship it today".
"Okay, I said wearily, biting back the epithets I longed to lob at him, "so what's your ETA?" Vinnie considers his words for a moment and says, "well, sometime between now and noon. Youse see nomally we can tell ya if we already loaded the truck, but were still loadin' it, so we can't tell ya exactly when. Prawbly bout' an hour and a haf." Making it, you guessed it... exactly noon.
Then I proceeded to don safety glasses and steel-toed over shoes every 30 minutes to run out to the factory floor and irritate the crew in Receiving to 'check on the status'. In between floor runs, I nearly downloaded a Trojan horse virus by opening a mail I would normally have never opened had I been in my right mind, locked myself out of a Non-Company database by keying in the wrong password repeatedly, banged my shin on an open file drawer and jammed my fingers in my desk drawer.
In between, I mourned, this was my project, the first one I'd really been given the lead on in all my time at Non-Company. I'm letting my new boss down. I should have checked the status on Friday. Why didn't I check the status on Friday?
So what does this all have to do with school....
At one point today, in a lull between phone calls, between catastrophes, I saw my mobile phone blinking. A strobing blue light, which says hey, you have a message, an email, an update. In this case a Facebook update. So I stole a moment away, strolled through my News Feed, and there I saw a photograph of my friends' daughter. Actually, the friend who was my best friend all through my adolescence, my school years. It was her daughter, all dressed up, first day of school. Fifth Grade. There were several photos. In fact, it appeared to be somewhat of an occasion, pictures with her Dad and sister, with her grandparents, walking to the bus, boarding the bus, her new backpack slung over her shoulder, new lunchbox in her hand. I once knew her grandparents well; growing up they were like a second family to me.
Looking at the pictures, it called back so many memories, this friend and I met at her daughter's age now. With about a six-month age gap between us, she would have been heading off to 4th grade and me to the 5th. But we always walked to the bus stop together. Away from school we were inseparable, the best of friends. Always passing notes, having sleepovers at each other's homes, talking on the phone until all hours. BFF's forever.
I felt hollow inside. We're Facebook friends but not friends in the way we were. Time, distance and different lifestyles have separated us. While I was wigging out at work, trying to solve my crisis, she was experiencing a milestone moment, putting her daughter on the bus. In a few weeks, I'll have mostly forgotten about today's crises, five months from now I won't remember it all, but she'll always have this day to remember. In younger days, we were so sure we'd always be friends, that we'd stay in the same place, that our kids would be friends. Sometimes it seems so implausible that I sit here, edging nearer to 40, and have no children, no spouse. A demanding job that seems to take up every moment of my life, my thoughts...my energy.
I still cherish a photo of us, well, the four of us, she and I, and my younger sister and her younger brother...we were quite a crew. And now...scattered, different states, different lives, all of them with children, she has 2, her brother 2, my sister 3, and me well....0. Sometimes I find it so hard to believe it turned out this way.
I've always believed in the core of my being, that God doesn't make mistakes, that our lives are as he would have us to be. But sometimes, a smaller, inner part of me wonders, was it God choosing this life or me refusing to be braver, to take more risks with my heart?
And every so often, at this time of year, I wish I were putting my kid on the bus.
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
Reinvention
It's been awhile, I know.
I am not sure if my sabbatical was the equivalent of a summer vacation, or that I couldn't sustain the pace I was trying to keep, or simply that I couldn't hear the voice in my head because of all the background noise, but in the end, I think it's just simply that I've needed time.
Lots of things going on since I last floated my fingertips across these keys. I buried my grandma, got a new boss, changed my hair color (slightly and not actually on purpose), found out my thyroid was out of whack (probably not the technical term for this condition), started learning elementary German on Babble, but most importantly I learned a lot about myself.
On my second to last post, my mother, revealed as one of the most prominent readers of this screed (hey I need all the fans I can get) mentioned that many of my posts sounded angry and it really shook me.
I stood back and took a hard look at myself. And when I began to really measure it and take stock, I was staggered at the sheer amount of negativity in my life. How many times had I metaphorically shot myself in the foot, not believing myself capable of the tasks entrusted to me?
It's hard to change, as a negative person, to begin to embrace positivity. Very. In fact, it's downright excrutiating for someone as diametrically opposed to change as myself.
Sometimes though, you get help along the way from the places and people from whom you'd least expect it. Remember in school when you were getting your schedule at the beginning of the year, how someone would look over your shoulder and shudder and say "Oh Wow, you got O'Malley for Bio!", as if to say, man are you in for it! But then unexpectedly, O'Malley would turn out to be the teacher you most remember looking back, because even though he was tough and demanding, you found yourself doing better and getting more out of his class, because he inspired you, because he believed you were capable of more than you'd even thought you were.
Remember how I said, I got a new boss. I didn't want one. No indeed, I was going along just fine, thank you very much, but Non-Company decided our team was getting one anyway. And there were a few fraught days where I teetered on the verge of taking my marbles and going home...after all... it's just an assignment anyway, right? I took a few days, went to Connecticut to attend my Grandma's memorial service, and I came back thinking, okay, I'll see what this guy is like.
Mr. New Boss is a very austere ex-Naval officer, incredibly soft-spoken in tone, yet somehow as steely as they come. And just like O'Malley the Bio teacher, he demands a great deal from you, but before he did that, he did something that no one had ever done before in all my days at Non-Company, he told me I was valued. And he conveyed the fact that he believed I could do more than I'd settled for. And somehow for the first time in many years, I was inspired again.
Please don't get me wrong here, there are plenty of stressful moments where the old me comes back the one that says, I feel that I just can't get this or that done, but then somehow I find myself digging deeper into reserves that I didn't know I had, because I don't want to let him down and also surprisingly I find, because I don't want to let Non-Company down. Not because of who they are, but suddenly because of who I am.
In many ways things are the same, but somehow, I've subtlety changed. I'm no longer angry at smart phones, I use one all the time and I love the exasperating little dude, I've embraced Kindle and wheras I once dismissed them as red-neck idiots, I now absolutely love the values and faith of Duck Dynasty. I've been to a food truck and while I still don't completely understand the allure, I won't knock it anymore. In short, I don't feel the need as much to run somebody else down to elevate myself and make me feel better.
I'll try to make it back to regular weekly postings and Flashback Fridays, and for those of you who are still reading this, I thank you...
I am not sure if my sabbatical was the equivalent of a summer vacation, or that I couldn't sustain the pace I was trying to keep, or simply that I couldn't hear the voice in my head because of all the background noise, but in the end, I think it's just simply that I've needed time.
Lots of things going on since I last floated my fingertips across these keys. I buried my grandma, got a new boss, changed my hair color (slightly and not actually on purpose), found out my thyroid was out of whack (probably not the technical term for this condition), started learning elementary German on Babble, but most importantly I learned a lot about myself.
On my second to last post, my mother, revealed as one of the most prominent readers of this screed (hey I need all the fans I can get) mentioned that many of my posts sounded angry and it really shook me.
I stood back and took a hard look at myself. And when I began to really measure it and take stock, I was staggered at the sheer amount of negativity in my life. How many times had I metaphorically shot myself in the foot, not believing myself capable of the tasks entrusted to me?
It's hard to change, as a negative person, to begin to embrace positivity. Very. In fact, it's downright excrutiating for someone as diametrically opposed to change as myself.
Sometimes though, you get help along the way from the places and people from whom you'd least expect it. Remember in school when you were getting your schedule at the beginning of the year, how someone would look over your shoulder and shudder and say "Oh Wow, you got O'Malley for Bio!", as if to say, man are you in for it! But then unexpectedly, O'Malley would turn out to be the teacher you most remember looking back, because even though he was tough and demanding, you found yourself doing better and getting more out of his class, because he inspired you, because he believed you were capable of more than you'd even thought you were.
Remember how I said, I got a new boss. I didn't want one. No indeed, I was going along just fine, thank you very much, but Non-Company decided our team was getting one anyway. And there were a few fraught days where I teetered on the verge of taking my marbles and going home...after all... it's just an assignment anyway, right? I took a few days, went to Connecticut to attend my Grandma's memorial service, and I came back thinking, okay, I'll see what this guy is like.
Mr. New Boss is a very austere ex-Naval officer, incredibly soft-spoken in tone, yet somehow as steely as they come. And just like O'Malley the Bio teacher, he demands a great deal from you, but before he did that, he did something that no one had ever done before in all my days at Non-Company, he told me I was valued. And he conveyed the fact that he believed I could do more than I'd settled for. And somehow for the first time in many years, I was inspired again.
Please don't get me wrong here, there are plenty of stressful moments where the old me comes back the one that says, I feel that I just can't get this or that done, but then somehow I find myself digging deeper into reserves that I didn't know I had, because I don't want to let him down and also surprisingly I find, because I don't want to let Non-Company down. Not because of who they are, but suddenly because of who I am.
In many ways things are the same, but somehow, I've subtlety changed. I'm no longer angry at smart phones, I use one all the time and I love the exasperating little dude, I've embraced Kindle and wheras I once dismissed them as red-neck idiots, I now absolutely love the values and faith of Duck Dynasty. I've been to a food truck and while I still don't completely understand the allure, I won't knock it anymore. In short, I don't feel the need as much to run somebody else down to elevate myself and make me feel better.
I'll try to make it back to regular weekly postings and Flashback Fridays, and for those of you who are still reading this, I thank you...
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
Reality Bites
The other day, my Mom who counts herself as one of my blog fans, remarked to me that the tenor of my posts seems to come off lately as angry. It was a bit startling to hear this, but after I pondered it for a bit, I came to think she was well, hate myself for saying this...right.
Today, after taking a cursory look at MSN, checking the headlines, stocks, French Open scores, I found the following article, entitled, "The Great Recession Wrecked Generation X" that I am posting a link to here:
http://money.msn.com/now/post.aspx?post=fc1c9c39-1c4a-4223-9ecb-2512551ec4b2
While I know a lot of people, including many in Gen X jib at the title of 'Generation X' or say,
"Oh, I don't buy into that", or "That doesn't apply to me", in my case, I think, this article encapsulates a lot of the anger that seems to be overflowing into my writing lately. Where the author, Jason Notte talks about Gen X since the Great Recession (Depression) being just older, and more tired, but certainly not any better off financially, I was mentally high-fiving him.
Finally, someone coming out and saying it. There were plenty of meglomaniacal posts in the 'Comments' sections from those who say that they weren't affected at all, let's face it there are always exceptions to any rule, but I think many of us, when we matriculated and entered the work force expected so much better. In my case, a crushing workload, which thanks to new cost-cutting measures, I can't even get overtime for, or health benefits, or vacation. When November rolls around, I will have hit the 2 year mark of the longest probationary period in history! And before you say, well you could leave and look for something better. Something better these days usually means another assignment and I already have one of those, a permanent job today is like trying to hit the motherlode in the Yukon! Because let's face it, the Boomers aren't retiring because they can't afford to, the Millenials want your job too and they are younger, cuter and more wired in, so where does that leave me? Really tired mostly, but in the more dire moments, staring into a gaping abyss of hopelessness. Believe it or not I used to be such an idealist; I go back and read the journal entries around the time of my high school graduation and my early days of college and there is such an optimistic, hopeful tone, I'm so excited by the possibilities of life, the feeling that everything is just out there waiting to be conquered. Truthfully, I almost can't read them anymore, knowing what I know now.
The thing is, I haven't given up...I care. I've tried to enact change politically, tried to believe that my congressman really does read the emails I send, that the Florida Governor, who I've ardently supported because he promised to bring employment to our state, will keep his promises. I vote even in the smallest elections, I write, I work hard, I pray.
They call us the slacker generation, but I know many of us are doing the same, working hard, voting, praying, hoping beyond hope, beyond what the experts tell us, beyond what the politicians don't do, beyond the promises they don't keep, that somehow we will beat the odds....
Today, after taking a cursory look at MSN, checking the headlines, stocks, French Open scores, I found the following article, entitled, "The Great Recession Wrecked Generation X" that I am posting a link to here:
http://money.msn.com/now/post.aspx?post=fc1c9c39-1c4a-4223-9ecb-2512551ec4b2
While I know a lot of people, including many in Gen X jib at the title of 'Generation X' or say,
"Oh, I don't buy into that", or "That doesn't apply to me", in my case, I think, this article encapsulates a lot of the anger that seems to be overflowing into my writing lately. Where the author, Jason Notte talks about Gen X since the Great Recession (Depression) being just older, and more tired, but certainly not any better off financially, I was mentally high-fiving him.
Finally, someone coming out and saying it. There were plenty of meglomaniacal posts in the 'Comments' sections from those who say that they weren't affected at all, let's face it there are always exceptions to any rule, but I think many of us, when we matriculated and entered the work force expected so much better. In my case, a crushing workload, which thanks to new cost-cutting measures, I can't even get overtime for, or health benefits, or vacation. When November rolls around, I will have hit the 2 year mark of the longest probationary period in history! And before you say, well you could leave and look for something better. Something better these days usually means another assignment and I already have one of those, a permanent job today is like trying to hit the motherlode in the Yukon! Because let's face it, the Boomers aren't retiring because they can't afford to, the Millenials want your job too and they are younger, cuter and more wired in, so where does that leave me? Really tired mostly, but in the more dire moments, staring into a gaping abyss of hopelessness. Believe it or not I used to be such an idealist; I go back and read the journal entries around the time of my high school graduation and my early days of college and there is such an optimistic, hopeful tone, I'm so excited by the possibilities of life, the feeling that everything is just out there waiting to be conquered. Truthfully, I almost can't read them anymore, knowing what I know now.
The thing is, I haven't given up...I care. I've tried to enact change politically, tried to believe that my congressman really does read the emails I send, that the Florida Governor, who I've ardently supported because he promised to bring employment to our state, will keep his promises. I vote even in the smallest elections, I write, I work hard, I pray.
They call us the slacker generation, but I know many of us are doing the same, working hard, voting, praying, hoping beyond hope, beyond what the experts tell us, beyond what the politicians don't do, beyond the promises they don't keep, that somehow we will beat the odds....
Friday, May 31, 2013
Gen X Retro Flashback- "Mr. Roboto" -Styx
This is for my sister Erin. Whenever I hear this song, I wish we could wind back the clock to 1983, lace up some roller skates and make absolute fools of ourselves.
Oh, and of course, grab a few Jolly Ranchers or an Atomic Fire Ball or two to snack on...
Oh, and of course, grab a few Jolly Ranchers or an Atomic Fire Ball or two to snack on...
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
Enter The Dragon (Lady)
A new temp started at Non-Company yesterday.
They never take someone around the first day and introduce them to 'the gang'; I guess it's because some temps never make it past lunchtime.
So today after said temp returned for the second day and apparently made it through the first day lunch period without sprinting to her car and re-enacting the OJ Car Chase-circa 1994, they decided 'What the heck?' and began the Non-Company tour of the factory floor, the conference rooms where she will soon attend her first bewildering Justice League Meeting, her first safety training where she will view what I like to call the, 'Reel of Horror' which basically comprises clips of former Non-Company unfortunates who were maimed or crippled for failing to observe safety precautions. If she's lucky she will view it before lunch, unlike some of us other unfortunates, who have never been quite the same since then when viewing the chili dogs on offer in Non-Company vending machines. Then they take her around and introduce her to the various departments.
Her guide on this tour is a semi-nemesis of mine, who flatly seems to disapprove of me, for reasons I've never been quite able to ascertain. Once again, I feel myself called upon to explain things in MASH terminology (I watched ALOT of MASH in my youth, if Pierce Brosnan as Remington Steele and Michael Weatherly as Tony DiNozzo were film savants, I am a MASH savant), in Non-Company parlance apparently I'm the Margaret Houlihan, the dragon lady, old 'Iron Drawers'. For Semi-Nemesis, instead of introducing me with a smile as we exchange friendly banter like she did with the rest of the Non-Com minions, says, "This is Jill, she keeps these guys in line and runs the department, all of your requests go through her first", although in print it seems to come across a lot warmer than it was said. All of the sudden, I picture myself clad in a prison matron's uniform, wearing combat boots, my hair cropped in a crew cut and for some reason a night stick, which I repeatedly strike across my right palm. Which is so far from the reality of me, who has fluffy bobbed blonde hair and wears lots of jewelry and artfully (I hope) applied cosmetics. I can actually see Newbie Temp shrink from me in much the same way she will a few weeks from now, when she views the 'Reel of Horror'. I try to smile warmly, but for some reason it falls flat. Done with me, they move on to the relative safety of my co-workers. Part of me wants to run after them, wailing, "Really, please give me another chance. I...I love puppies, kittens, sunsets, unicorns, ummm...Justin Bieber...okay, actually I loathe the 'Biebs', but I didn't totally hate that 'Baby, Baby..Oh' song...okay I did, but....please, please...."
I go on to spend a great deal of my lunch hour pondering what it is about me, that creates this alter-ego, this Thatcher-esque 'Iron Lady'. Full disclosure is, I am the only female in my department. It's me and seven other dudes (and no they ARE not dwarves!) I've had to develop a tough skin, a fondness for racy jokes, frat humor, to try to stay elevated just enough above the double-entredes so that I keep my ladylike manner but not be a prig either. I bake them cupcakes for birthdays, keep the candy jar filled, get greeting cards signed on all the appropriate occasions, at the same time, I have to be able to judiciously officiate the occasional infighting, while trying to maintain my reports, my own workload, the extra 'secretarial' duties, arranging lunch for meetings, arranging housing for long-term business trips, scheduling meetings, reminding them about said meetings, and that means I don't have time for the office politics crap. I don't sit on committees, and I don't come in sharing all the gory details of my weekends, because here's the thing, while to women drama is mother's milk, guys don't like it so much. I tend to spend my lunch hours away from the office, away from the lunch room gossip, because I so desperately need those 30-50 mins to myself to maintain my sanity, to read, make phone calls, restore my equilibrium. I guess to them that means I'm stuck-up, but for me it's the difference between cracking up and being a sane and functioning human being.
Don't get me wrong, of all the things I might find wrong about Non-Company, my department is not one of them, the guys I work for are gold. You'd be hard-pressed to find a harder working, more dedicated, talented crew anywhere, but it sets me apart from the rest of the company. It's almost like I can hear the whispers, "That's the girl that works in that department with all the guys, yeah, I've heard about her."...
I wonder if it carries over into the rest of my life. One of my Non-Company dudes once said to me, something to the effect of, I was all hard shell on the outside, with a soft center that rarely gets seen. I ponder what makes me like this. Is it hard-wired into my personality, a hold-over from school days where I was shunned by the other kids for wearing thick glasses and reading all the time? For being a weirdo who actually preferred being quiet and listening to music instead of going out partying and socializing. I was so super-introverted that I really never learned exactly how to socialize, to flirt, how to talk out my feelings. I've heard it before from plenty of people, including an ex-boyfriend who stated, "I never know exactly what you are thinking, because you only share to a point."
I worry that maybe I am Margaret Houlihan, desperate to be included but unwilling to grovel,
"Did you ever once offer me a lousy cup of coffee?"
And I wonder what Newbie Temp would think if I told her how much I envy her this chance to be just that, a new person, cloaked in mystery, someone everyone wants to meet and find out about, not the dragon lady persona I am not even sure how I came to inhabit. But one whose scales I can't seem to shake.
They never take someone around the first day and introduce them to 'the gang'; I guess it's because some temps never make it past lunchtime.
So today after said temp returned for the second day and apparently made it through the first day lunch period without sprinting to her car and re-enacting the OJ Car Chase-circa 1994, they decided 'What the heck?' and began the Non-Company tour of the factory floor, the conference rooms where she will soon attend her first bewildering Justice League Meeting, her first safety training where she will view what I like to call the, 'Reel of Horror' which basically comprises clips of former Non-Company unfortunates who were maimed or crippled for failing to observe safety precautions. If she's lucky she will view it before lunch, unlike some of us other unfortunates, who have never been quite the same since then when viewing the chili dogs on offer in Non-Company vending machines. Then they take her around and introduce her to the various departments.
Her guide on this tour is a semi-nemesis of mine, who flatly seems to disapprove of me, for reasons I've never been quite able to ascertain. Once again, I feel myself called upon to explain things in MASH terminology (I watched ALOT of MASH in my youth, if Pierce Brosnan as Remington Steele and Michael Weatherly as Tony DiNozzo were film savants, I am a MASH savant), in Non-Company parlance apparently I'm the Margaret Houlihan, the dragon lady, old 'Iron Drawers'. For Semi-Nemesis, instead of introducing me with a smile as we exchange friendly banter like she did with the rest of the Non-Com minions, says, "This is Jill, she keeps these guys in line and runs the department, all of your requests go through her first", although in print it seems to come across a lot warmer than it was said. All of the sudden, I picture myself clad in a prison matron's uniform, wearing combat boots, my hair cropped in a crew cut and for some reason a night stick, which I repeatedly strike across my right palm. Which is so far from the reality of me, who has fluffy bobbed blonde hair and wears lots of jewelry and artfully (I hope) applied cosmetics. I can actually see Newbie Temp shrink from me in much the same way she will a few weeks from now, when she views the 'Reel of Horror'. I try to smile warmly, but for some reason it falls flat. Done with me, they move on to the relative safety of my co-workers. Part of me wants to run after them, wailing, "Really, please give me another chance. I...I love puppies, kittens, sunsets, unicorns, ummm...Justin Bieber...okay, actually I loathe the 'Biebs', but I didn't totally hate that 'Baby, Baby..Oh' song...okay I did, but....please, please...."
I go on to spend a great deal of my lunch hour pondering what it is about me, that creates this alter-ego, this Thatcher-esque 'Iron Lady'. Full disclosure is, I am the only female in my department. It's me and seven other dudes (and no they ARE not dwarves!) I've had to develop a tough skin, a fondness for racy jokes, frat humor, to try to stay elevated just enough above the double-entredes so that I keep my ladylike manner but not be a prig either. I bake them cupcakes for birthdays, keep the candy jar filled, get greeting cards signed on all the appropriate occasions, at the same time, I have to be able to judiciously officiate the occasional infighting, while trying to maintain my reports, my own workload, the extra 'secretarial' duties, arranging lunch for meetings, arranging housing for long-term business trips, scheduling meetings, reminding them about said meetings, and that means I don't have time for the office politics crap. I don't sit on committees, and I don't come in sharing all the gory details of my weekends, because here's the thing, while to women drama is mother's milk, guys don't like it so much. I tend to spend my lunch hours away from the office, away from the lunch room gossip, because I so desperately need those 30-50 mins to myself to maintain my sanity, to read, make phone calls, restore my equilibrium. I guess to them that means I'm stuck-up, but for me it's the difference between cracking up and being a sane and functioning human being.
Don't get me wrong, of all the things I might find wrong about Non-Company, my department is not one of them, the guys I work for are gold. You'd be hard-pressed to find a harder working, more dedicated, talented crew anywhere, but it sets me apart from the rest of the company. It's almost like I can hear the whispers, "That's the girl that works in that department with all the guys, yeah, I've heard about her."...
I wonder if it carries over into the rest of my life. One of my Non-Company dudes once said to me, something to the effect of, I was all hard shell on the outside, with a soft center that rarely gets seen. I ponder what makes me like this. Is it hard-wired into my personality, a hold-over from school days where I was shunned by the other kids for wearing thick glasses and reading all the time? For being a weirdo who actually preferred being quiet and listening to music instead of going out partying and socializing. I was so super-introverted that I really never learned exactly how to socialize, to flirt, how to talk out my feelings. I've heard it before from plenty of people, including an ex-boyfriend who stated, "I never know exactly what you are thinking, because you only share to a point."
I worry that maybe I am Margaret Houlihan, desperate to be included but unwilling to grovel,
"Did you ever once offer me a lousy cup of coffee?"
And I wonder what Newbie Temp would think if I told her how much I envy her this chance to be just that, a new person, cloaked in mystery, someone everyone wants to meet and find out about, not the dragon lady persona I am not even sure how I came to inhabit. But one whose scales I can't seem to shake.
Friday, May 24, 2013
Gen X Retro Flashback- "Goonies-R-Good Enough"- Part 1
Memorial Day Weekend in American parlance has always been synonomous with backyard BBQ, beer, and for some reason Summer Movie Box-Office.
If you mention the word,'Goonies' to most Gen X'ers', they'll probably get a goofy smile on their face, and start telling you where they saw it, and who with.
And then they'll start talking about, 'One-Eyed Willie', the 'Truffle Shuffle', 'Sloth' and most everything Chunk and Mouth say throughout the film...
In 1985, Cyndi Lauper made a lengthy video in two parts, which are here in two videos. Look for a youngish Steven Spielberg making a cameo, as well as wrestlers Captain Lou Albano, Rowdy Roddy Piper and a very young Andre the Giant, who will forever be Fezzik from The Princess Bride to me.
But the one thing that every Gen X'er knows, is that 'Goonies Never Say Die'! You know I had to say it....
If you mention the word,'Goonies' to most Gen X'ers', they'll probably get a goofy smile on their face, and start telling you where they saw it, and who with.
And then they'll start talking about, 'One-Eyed Willie', the 'Truffle Shuffle', 'Sloth' and most everything Chunk and Mouth say throughout the film...
In 1985, Cyndi Lauper made a lengthy video in two parts, which are here in two videos. Look for a youngish Steven Spielberg making a cameo, as well as wrestlers Captain Lou Albano, Rowdy Roddy Piper and a very young Andre the Giant, who will forever be Fezzik from The Princess Bride to me.
But the one thing that every Gen X'er knows, is that 'Goonies Never Say Die'! You know I had to say it....
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