The past few days I’ve been feeling a distinct lack of inspiration for writing. It’s taken every ounce of grit I have in me to make myself post. I just know that if let myself skip even one day, soon I’ll be on a downward spiral and you won’t hear from Girl Friday until someone invariably kicks my ass. Said ass kicking usually come from those damn inspirational (more like conspiratorial) quotes in my daily planner, a fortune cookie, or Lucky 10-Key complaining that she’s bored at work.
Instead of being shaken up by judgmental quotes, I’ll give you a few of my new favorites.
Rosalind Russell, the most famous girl Friday said, “Flops are a part of life’s menu and I’ve never been a girl to miss out on any of the courses.” Flops don’t always taste great, but I think they cleanse the palette. If we always made the right choice, we’d miss the subtle changes in ourselves and I don’t think success would taste so sweet. I feel like this is a subject that Lucky 10-Key and I talk about on a regular basis. Just this evening she was trying to tell me not to worry so much about things I can’t control. It’s hard letting go! Isn’t it funny how easy that advice is for her to dispense, and yet she has doubts about her recent career move? I’m glad she got out of her last place when she did! I was just about to go up there and beat the crap out of her supervisor. No joke.
Stephanie Goddard Davidson said, “Instead of developing your personality, charm, or intellect, try exercising your character today.” Oh, so difficult! Some days, character is the only thing that holds my life together. I got into a rather sticky situation with the Professional Organization for Women (POW) today. The president is angry that I’m going to miss tomorrow’s retreat—I told her last week that I couldn’t go. The fact of the matter is, I am too busy to attend and it’s unfair to abandon my team during such a critical time. I have responsibilities to attend to, and I don’t feel that I should have to justify that. It would have been so easy to say something witty to the president to make her like me, but I knew the right thing to do was be honest and not make excuses. She showed no sympathy for me, and instead made feel like a seven year old. She asked if I could get out of work if she wrote a note to my boss. My boss isn’t my mother! I feel like my contributions at work are undervalued, and she will continue to perpetuate that notion by insisting that POW is more important than my job duties. Enough with her. I’m this close to quitting POW altogether!
Hopefully as things calm down, Girl Friday will be at her full strength and she’ll astound you with her sharp tongue and astute observations! For now, you’ll have to settle for random musings.
I’ve been dealing with major suckage at work. I have more projects than I can handle, an endless list of questions that I can never get answers for, and people that take little interest in what happens on my side of the cubicle. I plowed through a ton of work the past two days, but I just got asked to take on another assignment, the Professional Organization for Women’s retreat is this upcoming Tuesday, and I have to work next Sunday.
I told the Beth, the POW president, (who happens to work in my department) that I might not be able to attend because I’m sort of drowning. She couldn’t even hold back her contempt. She asked me if I understood the enormity and the importance of the organization and this annual retreat. I busied myself and tried to slink away from the interrogation. Instead of harassing me she could have shown some compassion for my workload. Beth’s office is one of the big assignments I’m dealing with. Her manager is having a bon voyage and their assistant retired. My boss and I are doing all we can to keep them from falling into a black hole of bureaucracy. All we get from them is a heap of complaints.
I let Beth’s comments roll off my back, but only because I had practice with her kind the previous night. I started a new writing class on Wednesday, and the woman who sat next to me, Gwen, was wretched. She’s one of those middle-aged hags who are so self-important but have nothing to base it on other than the fact that they are busy with meaningless nothings. Whatever. Maybe she’s a nice woman with a community spirit. Either way, she made me feel like I had no right to be in the room with the other forty odd (and I mean ODD) wannabe writers. I know Eleanor Roosevelt said, “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent,” so I guess Gwen got a hold of a forged permission slip…
Despite these two women and their disparaging remarks, I feel okay with where things are headed. I know I have a lot to learn at work, and one of those things is saying NO. I probably need to drop out of POW. My heart really isn’t in it. I’m going to end up resenting the people even more than I already do if I don’t speak up. I also know that I may not be a prolific writer, yet, but at least 36 people read my work on a daily basis. Gwen should be so lucky!
So, I found sunshine in all the gloom and doom.
I have been troubled recently by some comments from friends and coworkers regarding my vocabulary. Apparently they think I’m highfalutin because I toss around words like wretched and horrid instead of bad, but all that proves is I adore thesauraus.com. I’m not even that great of a speller (I had to look up thesaurus). Speaking of spelling, one of the kiddies at the after school program my department runs fell in love with the word pulchritude after hearing it in Akeelah and the Bee. When it was her turn to sprinkle the other kids with a thoughtful wish, she wished them all pulchritude…in short she wished them all great beauty.
Another consensus among my peers is that I’m wise, but I’m here to tell you that I’ve been watching Oprah since I was 9 and I’m a quote-hound. I’m not really that smart or knowledgeable, but I am a good listener and sometimes I get on my high horse and condescend to give advice. The other day Nancy K. cried because of her jackass of a boyfriend’s inability to be emotionally available. I pointed out the correlation between his remote mountain location and his fickle demeanor. It struck a chord with her and it seemed to put things into perspective. She went on to explain that she’d asked him repeatedly to open up and even after he promised to change, he never followed through. I channeled Dr. Phil and told her that, “When someone shows you who they are–believe them.”
It’s hard to deal with the image I’ve created in my likeness–one of confidence and empathy, and superiority of mind. In essence I’m just me…Girl Friday, Superheroine of Small Offices Everywhere…I’m just a girl trying to live. I haven’t had great adventures or experienced trials and tribulations. Who am I to be a sage?
In my heart I’m just a small town girl who likes to read, dream, and write. In my imagination I’ve walked fields of heather in the English countryside, I’m a space cowgirl, I’ve danced a pas de deux, I’m a romantic/tragic/comedic heroine, I’m the lead, I’m the star. I have lived several lives vicariously and I’ve stolen the best bits. I keep them in my pocket like great one-liners and pull them out as needed in front of tough crowds. It’s all just smoke and lights.