I've seen every maternal blood relative I have on this earth over the past week and I AM DONE.
I just can't take anymore for awhile.
The gushing flow of stories are just too cold prickly and full of sadness to keep on wading through them. I'm going to stop.
..........
Of course, I'm returning to this post over a week later and I can't even recall what was so particularly awful.
And since turning a very potent experience into a story where *I* wasn't involved worked well before, I think I'll try that hand again.
Thursday, November 30, 2006
Monday, November 20, 2006
First Time - Draft 2
I left the post-it on his desk because I couldn't end the day without making sure Jack knew he was wrong: JP call EB.
This morning, Jack sat across the table in the small conference room and said, "I will not, Evan. They refuse to participate."
"What...?"
"They refuse to participate. So. I have respect for the hierarchical structure of this organization. I have informed my manager and it is his problem now. The organization's problem - Not Mine."
"Did they give a reason why?"
"I don't care why."
I couldn't look him in the eye. The issue I had stumbled across was a hot one. I tried again and again to elicit a clear picture of the conflict from his information. Even after an hour all I could see was a gaping hole where the "big picture" of the situation should be.
Like a black cloud, it hovered above and to the right of his close-cropped hairline. Beyond a shoulder that leaned hard, aggressively nonchalant on the arm of a blue chair.
"I'm not upset!" he said again, raising his voice. "I also don't care why and I won't do anything about it until I'm asked. Until then, I don't know there is a problem." One of many conflicts in our organization; Dogging him, and like a stray mutt, just as pointedly ignored.
I hate recognizing it when he acts like a five year old. I feel compelled to cover his ass.
So I spent my workday in someone else's problem. Not Jack's problem, not mine: a problem that should have been confronted by the whole organization...but was instead being tossed over cubicle half-walls like a hot potato.
A conflict averse work environment with no management leadership. A fun place to work. Places like this one need lubricant in the form of neutral third parties, troublemakers...HR managers. The organizational caretakers and problem solvers of the world who are powerfully motivated to solve heated and divisive problems. Not necessarily urgent ones: the ones all about communication and personalities and styles of interaction.
As HR Managers go, I am good at my job. I challenged, asked questions, developed a plan of action. I used individual discussions with each personality to understand the whole picture. I spoke with everyone struggling busily to avoid solving the problem.
Suddenly, after 6PM, my own yellow sticky note was in front of my face. Between me and my monitor, I saw my own scrawl stuck to Jack's clean hand. Polished, even nails confronted me at the end of an arm, covered by the softest brushed cotton twill.
He walks up silently, but I never jump anymore. Every part of his body invades the typical, American "personal space." Jack knows he is mandated to keep the distance clear, and he is reminded in a painful waste of two productive hours, every two years, at the Sexual Harassment Prevention course. Maybe I should make him go annually.
"Is it brief? I want to go home," he said while draping himself, quite at ease, in my guest chair. I turned a few pages in a nearby notebook, then swiveled to face him.
"You're wrong," I said, knowing I was safe. "I want you to be successful, and I can't take it when you are, instead, being a complete ass. Change your attitude. I spoke with everyone individually today and the only person with a problem is you. Come back Monday with that problem fixed. Because you're my hero, and I can't stand it when you're wrong."
"Allright. That's fine," came from a tired Jack. He stood up to go, but only moved a foot away. He picked up a magazine from the cubicle next to mine, and stood, looking down at a picture of a famous actress. Well, once famous, then an obesity poster child, now a slim sexpot of a woman again.
"Amazing," he said. And then stood there. With that invitation, I got up to stand next to him. He wanted me to look at the picture I had already noticed returning to my desk a half hour before. I couldn't see the picture this time.
-Comment-
All I could see was the rough stubble across his face at the end of such a long day. Striking on someone meticulously clean shaven each morning.
-Response-
I realized that he smelled fantastic, and I took a deep breath, staring down at a Cover Girl but seeing Jack's chin, neck...an open collar.
-See you Monday-
My strong urge to rub a hand, a cheek, a chest, a groin...across that abrasive surface was overwhelming...and stifled immediately.
I returned to my chair, feeling pumped with the ache of arousal and weak with the cold of imagined betrayal. Emotionally unfaithful for the first time.
This morning, Jack sat across the table in the small conference room and said, "I will not, Evan. They refuse to participate."
"What...?"
"They refuse to participate. So. I have respect for the hierarchical structure of this organization. I have informed my manager and it is his problem now. The organization's problem - Not Mine."
"Did they give a reason why?"
"I don't care why."
I couldn't look him in the eye. The issue I had stumbled across was a hot one. I tried again and again to elicit a clear picture of the conflict from his information. Even after an hour all I could see was a gaping hole where the "big picture" of the situation should be.
Like a black cloud, it hovered above and to the right of his close-cropped hairline. Beyond a shoulder that leaned hard, aggressively nonchalant on the arm of a blue chair.
"I'm not upset!" he said again, raising his voice. "I also don't care why and I won't do anything about it until I'm asked. Until then, I don't know there is a problem." One of many conflicts in our organization; Dogging him, and like a stray mutt, just as pointedly ignored.
I hate recognizing it when he acts like a five year old. I feel compelled to cover his ass.
So I spent my workday in someone else's problem. Not Jack's problem, not mine: a problem that should have been confronted by the whole organization...but was instead being tossed over cubicle half-walls like a hot potato.
A conflict averse work environment with no management leadership. A fun place to work. Places like this one need lubricant in the form of neutral third parties, troublemakers...HR managers. The organizational caretakers and problem solvers of the world who are powerfully motivated to solve heated and divisive problems. Not necessarily urgent ones: the ones all about communication and personalities and styles of interaction.
As HR Managers go, I am good at my job. I challenged, asked questions, developed a plan of action. I used individual discussions with each personality to understand the whole picture. I spoke with everyone struggling busily to avoid solving the problem.
Suddenly, after 6PM, my own yellow sticky note was in front of my face. Between me and my monitor, I saw my own scrawl stuck to Jack's clean hand. Polished, even nails confronted me at the end of an arm, covered by the softest brushed cotton twill.
He walks up silently, but I never jump anymore. Every part of his body invades the typical, American "personal space." Jack knows he is mandated to keep the distance clear, and he is reminded in a painful waste of two productive hours, every two years, at the Sexual Harassment Prevention course. Maybe I should make him go annually.
"Is it brief? I want to go home," he said while draping himself, quite at ease, in my guest chair. I turned a few pages in a nearby notebook, then swiveled to face him.
"You're wrong," I said, knowing I was safe. "I want you to be successful, and I can't take it when you are, instead, being a complete ass. Change your attitude. I spoke with everyone individually today and the only person with a problem is you. Come back Monday with that problem fixed. Because you're my hero, and I can't stand it when you're wrong."
"Allright. That's fine," came from a tired Jack. He stood up to go, but only moved a foot away. He picked up a magazine from the cubicle next to mine, and stood, looking down at a picture of a famous actress. Well, once famous, then an obesity poster child, now a slim sexpot of a woman again.
"Amazing," he said. And then stood there. With that invitation, I got up to stand next to him. He wanted me to look at the picture I had already noticed returning to my desk a half hour before. I couldn't see the picture this time.
-Comment-
All I could see was the rough stubble across his face at the end of such a long day. Striking on someone meticulously clean shaven each morning.
-Response-
I realized that he smelled fantastic, and I took a deep breath, staring down at a Cover Girl but seeing Jack's chin, neck...an open collar.
-See you Monday-
My strong urge to rub a hand, a cheek, a chest, a groin...across that abrasive surface was overwhelming...and stifled immediately.
I returned to my chair, feeling pumped with the ache of arousal and weak with the cold of imagined betrayal. Emotionally unfaithful for the first time.
Friday, November 10, 2006
The First Time
I wrote a post quite some time ago about a loosely 'sexual' experience with flirting I had...at age 33.
This story is about a similar experience. I was not going to blog it here, because I know my husband reads my blog...and the idea of him reading it made me feel guilty. I believe the content may "hurt" a little bit in some way, and I deperately want to avoid hurting him - I love him so much.
But there is this need to expose the experience to the light of day and examine it before it becomes a secret: I hate secrets. Hate secrets in a way that only an adult who has a vestigial molested child lurking inside can.
In my further defense (though I don't need one, Dammit!) my "Blog Hero" thinks nothing of descriptions of cute chicks at Hooters, and hot Booth Babes, and being struck senseless by beautiful women. He has eyes, he has a dick, he has a libido. He expresses the thoughts that are wound up with those things. Yet I shrink from doing that.
I read a short story called "Tastings" by Neil Gaiman last week, in a short story collection which had lots of not-fun sexually explicit stories. In his preface to "Tastings" he talked about how writing the story took him a long time (paraphrasing from memory here) because the content was embarassing to him...made him blush, and made him have to stop, then come back to the story. The content was extremely sexually explicit, which might have had something to do with the embarassment.
From that preface, I am choosing to take away the idea that there is some value in getting out the ideas...even when as writers we have huge emotional reactions to the content. And in this case, it is probably best to get it outside of me, into my "clear" space.
So, from the assumptions that:
1) Finding someone other than your partner attractive is not something to feel guilt over (as long as you don't act on it), and
2) Sharing the fact that attraction is evidenced, may hurt your partner, and fundamentally if they choose to read your blog after you've warned them, it is their own fault, and
3) Telling a story and letting an idea play out can only strengthen storytelling and writing abilities, even if it doesn't feel good to do so....here's the story.
This story is about a similar experience. I was not going to blog it here, because I know my husband reads my blog...and the idea of him reading it made me feel guilty. I believe the content may "hurt" a little bit in some way, and I deperately want to avoid hurting him - I love him so much.
But there is this need to expose the experience to the light of day and examine it before it becomes a secret: I hate secrets. Hate secrets in a way that only an adult who has a vestigial molested child lurking inside can.
In my further defense (though I don't need one, Dammit!) my "Blog Hero" thinks nothing of descriptions of cute chicks at Hooters, and hot Booth Babes, and being struck senseless by beautiful women. He has eyes, he has a dick, he has a libido. He expresses the thoughts that are wound up with those things. Yet I shrink from doing that.
I read a short story called "Tastings" by Neil Gaiman last week, in a short story collection which had lots of not-fun sexually explicit stories. In his preface to "Tastings" he talked about how writing the story took him a long time (paraphrasing from memory here) because the content was embarassing to him...made him blush, and made him have to stop, then come back to the story. The content was extremely sexually explicit, which might have had something to do with the embarassment.
From that preface, I am choosing to take away the idea that there is some value in getting out the ideas...even when as writers we have huge emotional reactions to the content. And in this case, it is probably best to get it outside of me, into my "clear" space.
So, from the assumptions that:
1) Finding someone other than your partner attractive is not something to feel guilt over (as long as you don't act on it), and
2) Sharing the fact that attraction is evidenced, may hurt your partner, and fundamentally if they choose to read your blog after you've warned them, it is their own fault, and
3) Telling a story and letting an idea play out can only strengthen storytelling and writing abilities, even if it doesn't feel good to do so....here's the story.
Password, Please.
I have been off blog for 30 days. No withdrawal pains...just off. Today I need to rant though because again, the place I work makes me CRAZY and I have thought about 564 times in the past hour, "Why do I work here...?"
There a quite a few answers, and they are acceptable for now: I like Security. I like Feeling Needed. I like Being The Underdog. I like The Idea That I "See Things" Others Do Not. I like The Idea That Communication Problems Can be Fixed. I like The Idea That Working Relationships Are Possible. I like the Moral High Ground of Being Seen As The Good Guy.
I have to go back to work now...I need to think later what this all means...what is it all about...? How does it fit into my vision of myself and my goals for the future.
You know, nothing BIG....And I'll be back soon to talk about the "Nothing Big." And this time, if I do it soon enough, it won't take me eternal seconds of brain processor power to remember the password.
There a quite a few answers, and they are acceptable for now: I like Security. I like Feeling Needed. I like Being The Underdog. I like The Idea That I "See Things" Others Do Not. I like The Idea That Communication Problems Can be Fixed. I like The Idea That Working Relationships Are Possible. I like the Moral High Ground of Being Seen As The Good Guy.
I have to go back to work now...I need to think later what this all means...what is it all about...? How does it fit into my vision of myself and my goals for the future.
You know, nothing BIG....And I'll be back soon to talk about the "Nothing Big." And this time, if I do it soon enough, it won't take me eternal seconds of brain processor power to remember the password.
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