Caterwauling

Going along the lines of the theory that it’s stupid to have two candidates for U.S. president yet 50 candidates for Miss America, I got to thinking about interviewing for jobs and how we think it’s perfectly normal to put a candidate through myriad interviews but yet prospective dates get a once-over from us. The only question we need to ask of a potential date is whether they sleep with women, and if the “interviews” are exhaustive, they can land themselves any position they want! 😉

I hired wonderful people at my old job, but my methods were nothing short of unconventional and I caused great grief to the HR person. And I admit, she was right about something. (*grits teeth, hits self on head with hammer*) Well, mostly, anyway.

I had a position open for a writer; after holding several roles by myself for eight months, I didn’t exactly have the time to do interviews. But when I was threatened that the position would be taken out of the budget if I didn’t hop to it, well, I found the time. 😉 Understand, I performed a lot of work and super-high-quality work at that, so I wasn’t overly impressed with the candidate pool. The person I ended up hiring, though, I’d gotten a good vibe from her resume alone. I believe in signs; I’m no dummy. I got her in for an interview.

I had four candidates; she made thet semi-finals. I’d chosen another guy to come into the semi-finals. And this is where I fought with HR and another person who was asked to be in on the interviews. I’d thought the girl was too ambitious, too talented, too GOOD for the job. She was driven and well-spoken and just emanated a no-bullshit aura. I loved her; she reminded me of me in a lot of ways.

And … I didn’t want to punish her by dragging her into that environment.

The guy? Perfect fit. Perfect, I say. Laid-back. Chose the chair in my office that practically hid him from my sight. (The girl took the one with the clear view of me. I notice these things.) He was sweet and charming yet shy and seemed like he’d be good (better) in a support role. I wanted to choose him.

This was where I went 10 rounds with the other employees. They thought I was nuts, that I was passing up great talent for OK talent. That I was passing up the more professional candidate for the one that fit our culture better. Which, how is that a bad thing? In a sea of mediocrity and my best friend and I were the only overachievers, how could I in my right mind take someone like us and ask them to survive there?

Here’s how funny life is. I did extend the offer to the kid. He hid for four days until finally sending me an e-mail that he accepted a better offer doing sports reporting. And good for him. I wished him well. I was pissed that he strung me along, but hey, I wouldn’t have wanted to work there either, in retrospect!

The girl was available and we did offer her the job. And the thing is, not only was she freaking awesome at her job, but she also became a very, very good friend. Her experience at the job was a good one because I was very much the “umbrella manager” — i.e., when Upper McManagement rained down their shitstorms, my people didn’t feel it. And they knew it. I kept them informed (maybe too much so, I admit) but kept them out of the line of fire.

It’s kind of funny how the details matter. I had asked my hire what she really liked about the position when we were talking about it, and of course it fit her goals blah blah blah. But then she said, “I saw your necklace, and I knew right away that no matter what the job might bring, you and I would click.”

And I’d smiled at her and said, “Same with you.”

My necklace was a sterling-silver martini charm, very tiny, with a tiny green crystal atop it to serve as the olive. Her necklace was a pentagram. And it’s not that I know a lot about earth-based religions (I respect, appreciate and sometimes even borrow their rituals), but I figured that’d scare the hell out of everyone and make them leave us alone. 🙂

I guess I type all this to say that just by interviewing someone, you can get a feel but you don’t really know what kind of worker they’ll be. I am a ditzy interviewee; I get off-topic and force myself a little too hard to hold eye contact sometimes and I like to stare at inanimate objects when I’m telling a story because I don’t want to see everyone’s reaction until I’m done telling my tale. I blow all the behavioral indicators out of the water and tend to be a frustrating candidate when it’s my turn to tap-dance. But what I lack in my initial presentation, I more than compensate for in 12-hour workdays and personal time/plans sacrificed to get the job done, and done well. And a virtual spigot of idea flow, if only anyone wants to turn on the faucet.

And that’s a high standard to hold other people to. But then again, why shouldn’t you?

I think what I liked best about my staff were that they let me be the idea generator. They knew I would talk a mile a minute and forget everything I said two hours later. They were the types to write down everything and come back with a, “Hey, that thing you mentioned? I did some research and if we did X, we could make that happen.”

And that’s what I need right now. I shoot out ideas all day but when all is said and done, I’m my own clean-up crew. And if nobody heard me say the idea, well, it never happened. I don’t mean to say I’m holding anything back; I’m just trying to realistically get through a day. Am I impressing anyone? Not really. But is my sanity in check? More or less.

But my hire held me very accountable, and while I saw that coming in her interviews (and it made me uncomfortable), it helped me in a big way. I am OK with failing myself. I cannot fail anyone else. And I wanted to do whatever it took to be a respectable leader. I think I achieved that. You can only lead those who want to follow you. And surrounding yourself with those kinds of people who have complementary skills yet with compatible personalities is the challenge. I don’t wish this process on anybody, but having had time to reflect on it, I’ll be more ready for it next time around.

As for my hire? She’s still there, getting paid more in the lower position than I made doing everybody’s jobs simultaneously. She feels bad that she works half the amount of hours that I did (and do, now that I’ve moved on). I think she does her job well, but they don’t ask much of her, and she’s OK with that. And the truth is, we both know she’s capable of so much more. I really do feel like I did her a disservice, bringing her into that unchallenging environment. But as she reminds me, she had a life and the rest of us who are so hell-bent on “challenging” ourselves have no lives and nothing to look forward to when we’re not at work.

That said, who the hell am I to decide about a person’s ambitions? I hate it when other people are right! 😉

I knew my elder cat took an out-of-the-(litter)box dump somewhere before I rolled home last night, but where, I still have no idea. I’ve combed the house and even hosed down the carpets and floor cushions with pet stain stuff, but this morning I’m sitting here at the computer, wanting to kill myself because of the eau de cat ass.

Considering that I have no furniture, it shouldn’t be this hard to find kitty chunks. I did dig a bunch out of Maddie’s ass crack (*sigh*) but I’m guessing she wiped her ass on something fabric.

Here’s to hoping my cats jump off the balcony (again) before I buy furniture. This time, I won’t go looking for them!

UPDATE

Gawd damn it. I just went to pick up a menu I’d left by the door (tonight’ll be a late one, so I was thinking of picking up a pizza on the way home). And not only did Maddie shit on the carpet there, but she’d pulled the menu over it! She covered up the crime.

I’m mad as hell, of course (Maddie’s one more shit away from going to a Vietnamese restauarant), but how can you hate a cat who’s that fucking smart?

So, apparently Thursday is Mental Health Screening Day. Which used to matter to me because it was my job to know these things but this year it occurred to me that I’ve got some mild anxiety and depression issues to contend with and I should go get screened so I can be covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act when I need a break from work.

(Yes, I’ve been thinking about this, oh, a TAD!)

So, I find two screening sites in my area and realize, well, I have to be at work during them.

*sigh* 🙂

Anyway, I really am a proponent of mental health — just not always my own. If you can swing the time, go get screened because nobody but you knows how you’re doing inside. I think we’ve all gotten trapped in the “mental illness” stigma but we need to replace it with “mental well-being.”

Depression/anxiety doesn’t necessarily mean you’re suicidal, but if you’ve pulled away from all your friends (*cough*), have gone from being a social butterfly to shutting yourself away from the world whenever possible (*cough cough*) and generally just not feeling overly like yourself anymore and you happen to miss that particular self (*cough* *choke* *gasp*), it’s safe to say that you’re in a position to get yourself well again.

And while talk therapy is in vogue, there’s nothing wrong with popping a pill here and there as a mood stabilizer before getting into any kind of regular therapy program. Even I’m beginning to wonder if blog/retail therapy isn’t enough for me.

I like to think I can do the mind-over-matter thing, and most days, I can. But it shouldn’t be such a struggle on those other days. Hence, if I decide I have to “check out” for awhile, trust me, it’s for the good of everyone, not just myself.

It’s been a long while — maybe ever — since I’ve been acquainted with “happy Goddess,” but “reasonably stable Goddess” is the best I can do these days, and if that means not only letting some things fall off the plate but also smashing a few of those plates off the nearest wall, well, it means I can be OK with eating off paper plates for awhile or just going out to dinner and not worrying about the mess. 😉

My best friend and I spent a good combined six or seven hours on the phone this weekend. (Gee, how nice it would have been to do it in person.) In any event, we had a fascinating discussion about how many of us take on the world’s problems, and when we ourselves encounter a roadblock, we get all atwitter and start babbling incoherently because we don’t know how to handle things that happen to us. Or maybe we do know but we’re so used to the caretaker role that I guess we just wish that someone would step into that role for us once in awhile.

I was telling her a story and she picked up on the finer details of it, in which someone had just basically told me that they’d take care of something. Understand, this is a foreign concept in my world. Me, not handling something? Not being involved from the beginning or at least coming in midstream and cleaning up the mess left behind? Me not ultimately resolving the situation, with amounts of effort and aggravation that will go not just unrewarded, but also unnoticed?

Anyway, she was trying to figure out what it was that impressed her so much about somebody doing me a favor (without me asking for it or even needing it, truth be told, although hot damn did I appreciate it), and I repeated a conversation I’d had with my mom awhile back. We don’t need the guys who claim to love puppies and long walks on beaches and all that sappy, happy romantic stuff. What we need? Someone who’s going to extract the problem from our death grips and tell us that they will take it from here.

Not to say we gals ain’t uber-capable of kicking ass, but when you’re in hyperdrive 24/7 (let’s face it, you know you are. I’ve seen you there), all things big and small get equally urgent (and sometimes, overwhelming) real estate in your mind and to-do list. And for those things that are small to the men yet still big to us, for them to offer to handle it doesn’t make us unable to run with the big boys — instead, it makes us breathe probably the first sigh of relief we’ve been able to exhale in years.

And even if I don’t take them up on their offer (which, yes I should when I can, and especially when there are things I can take off their hands when I can do them with equal ease as they can handle my drama), hell. Just their asking puts a lot of things back into perspective. Because when they can take it from here, we can take care of ourselves and each other so much better.

I always wonder what brought my friend and her husband together, and this discussion spurred her to remember it. They were living on separate coasts — he in Manhattan, she in Seattle — and she was preparing to move here for him. And everything went to shit, including wrecking her car. And she was nuts over it of course. He’d told her not to worry about it — he would handle the details. And she’s like me — details are not to be trusted elsewhere. But for some reason she believed him — believed in him — and 10 years later they’re still together, so he must’ve done something right. 😉

Amazing what a few simple words and a little bit of faith can produce. …

Because Dr. McSteamy (*quiver*) is officially joining the “Grey’s Anatomy” cast.

Busy, busy weekend. I’ve neglected a lot of housework because on the weekends? I’m out. I don’t go anywhere special — mostly on unplanned field trips. I don’t care if it’s pouring (and for awhile, it was) — I just need to be in a thousand different places, preferably with sunlight. As long as I’m a moving target, I’m happy.

Folks who tag along with me either think I’m a mastermind at finding shit to do on a whim and others who are more planful want me to just pick a direction and go with it.

Anyway, because I spend way too much time cooped up with my whereabouts always accounted for (*headslam*), this weekend’s theme was to find something fall-ish to do. Back in Pittsburgh, I knew where all the farms were and could drive you blindfolded to a pumpkin-picking hayride odyssey. (I particularly loved Triple B for activities but Trax Farms for its amazing country store. God, I miss it.)

So I found the poor man’s Trax, Butler’s Orchard. I’ve been there before and was wholly disappointed in it, but I’d forgotten how much of a waste of time it was until I started driving there early yesterday morning and it was RAINING like a mofo. As it was a sucktacular day I didn’t get any fall photos, as I’d intended. But then again, all the foliage is dry and crackling and not even turning pretty colors, so I definitely don’t want to remember this crappy excuse for my favorite season.

Anyway, the store at the orchard? Sucks. I spent way too much money on their baked goods and pumpkin-type cake mixes and apple cider and shit like that, but I wanted decorations and that dream burst pretty quickly. There were no fewer than two dozen kids in the tiny shop, ripping around and knocking shit over. We were not awake enough to have chitlins underfoot and certainly not amused when they’d pick up apples and throw them across the store.

Not to mention, but this one family had four strollers and parked themselves in front of an area we wanted to peruse. And let me put it this way, I’m pushy. I’ll stand back and smile and sort of send death glares if everyone ignores me. But then I’ll just squeeze my way in and push you out of my way if I’m so inclined. These bitches weren’t moving. And even when I did get to the display, it was fug anyway.

What I failed to realize was that B.O. is right behind Wal-Mart. Where, of course, I found a punkin wonderland full of delightfully hokey crap that made my morning. Of course, I also got “scary” to accompany “cute” just with the odd variety of redneck shoppers there. My one friend who just left the area always told me to never, ever venture beyond exit 10 on I-270 (Wal-Mart’s around exit 16) or else you’ll feel like you’ve entered “Deliverance.” He’s right. *shudder* I usually try to stay below exit 4, and will continue to do so in the future.

However, we did drop down to exit 6 briefly to attend to the Rockville Music Festival yesterday. I mean, Blue Oyster Cult was the headliner and it was also a chili cook-off. (See “fall” theme — hot, spicy food. Mmm.) I really only tried the chili from Hard Times Cafe (very spicy and tasty) before heading to California Tortilla for takeout.

Now, I’ve rambled about all this to come to the conclusion, which is that I’ve climbed onto a kick where I want to bake spiced pumpkin muffins and make a pot of chili. Which, I’ll tell you exactly how that’s going to turn out. I bought canned pumpkin and evaporated milk and chili-starter stuff, and next year at this time, I’ll be going into the pantry with the same shit and realize, oh, yeah I’d had the same idea last year (and the year before that …).