Caterwauling

I’ll never understand companies taking headshots and/or putting people on video in a pandemic.

My job used to be to help people get ready for such things.

Not the makeup, although I did lend more than one dude my powder foundation on more than one occasion.

Rather, I was often pulled in to get the guys talking, to loosen them up. And, on occasion, they were sent to my office like I was the nice principal, to give them a pep talk.

I do it more on a volunteer basis now. But I just had one of those flashbacks to a time when it was a vital part of the job.

Now they all look like they just got off Skype with their wives. That is, as one once typed to me like the delight she was, “a Very Bad Idea.”

Good times.

I came across an old FB post from a decade or so ago.

My Pet Psycho(TM) had struck. And we were all talking about him on Faceypages.

This particular act shocked me for a moment. (Back then, and now as I read it again.) Not just in its cruelty, but more in bafflement of how I did not get in my car and put my foot up his ass.

Well, he’d have liked it, that’s why.

In any event, I got to thinking about this blog. And how, sure, I used to write a whole lot about my life on it. But also how no one who ever read it could possibly have even the tiniest inkling about who I am and what I stand for.

And today, to have another foot-up-ass-worthy type or two believing they know anything about me from reading a few thousand posts, please.

I get it, though. They use me as an avatar. The villain of their story on whom to project all their own struggles to be a good human.

I read an article recently that said we hate-watch people because everything they say/do reinforces our smug superiority over them.

Is that what you guys do? Wait for me to breathe so you can criticize it?

I have an avatar too. I’ve never even met this person and don’t even know how we ended up connected on social media.

I don’t seek her out. But when I see her overly overjoyed posts about whatever she’s eating, I sing my little made-up song about her (to the tune of the Kit-Kat song) and move along.

Moving along is the best part of the story. Some of y’all should try it sometime.

Better yet, find a new avatar to stoke your rage — I’d prefer my intellectual (as it were) property to be used to inspire GOOD things.

Bye now.

A friend once told me she was looking for a job while she was still happy enough to be picky.

I usually leave while I’m still happy. Which makes for a lot of looking back.

One time I wasn’t happy was 10 years ago this week. I quit the job I came to Florida for. Like, walked in, handed them a letter, left my laptop, and flounced the fuck out.

I regret that move. It took two years to work off that karma. Would not recommend.

Someone had left two comments on my Faceypages wall, which just came up in my memories:

“Don’t you feel like you were just told you don’t have cancer anymore?”

“So long to editing uninspiring copy from uninspired writers.”

Most separations weren’t quite the cause for celebration. But the one thing that unites them all is looking back and seeing with fresh eyes the stuff that put tiny little cracks in your heart along the way.

I got to thinking about when our Delray office was taken away from us and I had to start driving 30+ minutes each way again.

How I had always dressed up in Delray but now suddenly I was getting called out left and right that my Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger and DKNY weren’t enough to one person’s liking.

How, as if it weren’t enough that I came in and did the jobs of three people who sat on their asses and watched me, I ended up on crutches.

But was I able to work from home, as I’d done once a week in Delray? No.

Was I able to dress down an iota? Nope.

Was I talked to about my comfier shoe choices when I had one ankle swelled up like a grapefruit? Yup!

I know none of that (was that from 2016?) had anything to do with the job I ended up leaving in 2020.

Most of those people were long gone who created that culture. And who stood aside and watched it happen. And who didn’t value ME but instead just let people manage the way they manage.

(Just like we let ole tRumpy believe he won the 2020 election. Let’s review how THAT turned out.)

In any event, no wonder everyone was surprised when I left. They had no idea. Heck, *I* had no idea how much I had stuffed deep inside my psyche.

Now that I help my mom more than ever, I think about that. I wouldn’t tell her to put on a suit and heels to walk to the kitchen. Especially when not a goddamn other person in the building looked like they did much more than shower that day. (Thinking of the guy who wore the same pants 4x/week. And jeans on Fridays. And how some could wear sneakers but my sandals were subject to commentary.)

And I will never get over some nasty bully BIATCH getting our good healthcare while I busted my ass and yet my mom couldn’t because she’s a mom and not whatever providers think “family” is.

I will still look back on that as my favorite job because I enjoyed it far more than the micro-aggressions that threatened to chip away at it.

But I don’t have those same micro-aggressions anymore. It’s weird having no conflict, so now I feel conflicted about that.

In any event, we have a lot of changes coming up. It’s nice having the mental bandwidth to participate in that.

If I had more of that, I’d still be where I was. But then I wouldn’t be where I am.

I figure we are now old enough and ugly enough to not act a fool anymore. But lemme know otherwise. I have a feeling there’s more fool left than anyone ever anticipated. And I always have more memes.

I have more expensive taste.

Anyway, my girl Tay!