So that 401K post got me thinking about my experience working in a law firm in Sacramento. It was an amazing job with uniquely interesting and good people doing seriously awesome work (natural resources conservation). I was proud when they hired me right out of college (as the receptionist), and I was proud to do other administrative work for them for almost 8 years.

However, since it was my first real job and they hired me at 23 years old, I did a bit of, um, “growing up” in that place.

Alright I was completely freaking clueless, though I thought I knew pretty much everything. I was like a walking law suit with a loud voice and questionable judgment.

But I knew it ALL.

I was 23. Duh. The Age of Omniscience.

Anyway I thought I’d share with you some of the most impressive lessons I learned at that firm, not in order of importance. So here we go.

The Office Survival Guide for people who probably shouldn’t be allowed in offices.

1. Be nice to the receptionist. Receptionists are people too.
2. You think the receptionist isn’t listening. The receptionist is listening. She knows pretty much everything about you and your mom and everybody else in the office, on account of everybody assuming she isn’t listening.
3. Do not wear black bras under white blouses to work.
4. Do not wear low-cut trousers and g-strings to work.
5. “You cannot just say everything you think to the attorneys you work for.” (Yes, that is a direct quote.)
6. Copy machines have top-loaders. (Wish I woulda known THAT little tidbit before I spent that summer internship in college making copies by hand, one by one. If I ever find the bastards who watched me do that all summer without telling me about the top-loader – I’ll kill ‘em.)
7. The “reply-all” email feature can ruin your life.
8. So can your potty mouth.
9. On a related note, there is no sarcasm font.
10. If you set up your cubicle in accordance with Feng Shui principles, you will not work more productively, but everybody will think it’s cool.
11. Burning popcorn in the microwave will make it stink for the duration. Nothing will fix it ever. Buy a new one.
12. The most annoying expressions in the world are: “At the end of the day;” “playing catch-up;” and “touch base.”
13. Oh, and “paradigm shift.”
14. You will cringe when you hear yourself saying these things but you will not be able to stop.
15. Talking on the phone while chewing is not okay under any circumstances.
16. There’s always somebody who knows more about whatever it is you think you know everything about. That person is in the room with you right now.
17. Emergency drills are scary, much scarier than the ones in grammar school.
18. {In the case of a real emergency, I would run full speed out of the building giving no thought or concern whatsoever to those around me.}
19. “Lower your voice” is uniformly solid advice.
20. Extreme pressure generally turns an ordinary project into an absolute disaster.
21. If you are wondering at all if you should say something, you shouldn’t.
22. The computer is not broken. You did something wrong. Re-start it. You’ll be fine.
23. If you think the project is going to take a week, tell your boss it’ll take four.
24. Even if you have no idea who or why a person is calling you, but they claim to be “returning your call,” assume they are correct and roll with it.
25. Some people walk around with paper on their heads and do other such silly things. You cannot do these things. People already think you’re weird.
26. Take notes as if your life depended on it, even if the note contains: “10/10/07: George told me about his trip to Madagascar, detailed incident with monkey.”
27. Don’t skip.
28. People frown on skipping in the workplace.
29. Also ballet moves. Total no-go.
30. You will become the woman who shows everybody pictures of her kids and talks about them too much. You will. Because you miss them.
31. Accept that you will never become completely professional. Aim instead for “professional enough to not get fired.”

It ain’t glamorous, but it works for some of us…

Happy Cubicle Day! (It’s not actually cubicle day. But it is in my head.)

The other day, while scowling at the absurdity of one of those feel-good chocolate hearts and roses Valentine’s ads, I placed my pointer finger against my face in the classic thinking posture and asked myself… “Hmmmm…what would an honest Valentine’s Day card say?”

And then, as this thought rolled around in my [acutely insane] brain, I realized that this is no simple question, but rather depends entirely on how long the couple has been together.

Because as you probably know…that shit CHANGES. (Relationships, that is. Men, not so much.)

So this small, profound monologue got me thinking about the fact that there are (in my opinion) three stages in a relationship/marriage, each of them obviously necessitating a different Valentine, were it to be honest and real and able to speak the truth of the insanity. Err, I mean “budding love story.”

Wow. Deep.

Anyhoo, I give you this. I ask that you please enjoy the clip art.

Stage 1

Years 0-2: The “I haven’t Been With You Long Enough to Realize How Much You Annoy Me” stage, comprised of long walks and hand-holding, starry-eyed dinners, cocktails, discussions, movie-watching, reasonable arguments, cuddling and pet names. Also, smug looks directed at women who are in Stages 2 and 3 with their men, and a distinct feeling of superiority, having obviously been deemed the first woman in history to not wonder if she could turn herself into a lesbian to avoid further intimacy with the male population. Also, women in this stage rest easy in the comfort and surety that they will never, ever want to pummel their little love kitten with a meat cleaver. Because he’s PERFECT. Duh.

A Stage 1 Valentine looks something like one of these:

And now…

Stage 2, Years 2-5: The “Holy Shit I had no Idea You Had These Sorts of Habits” Stage, also known as the “I Must Mold You Into Something More Like What I Had In Mind” Stage, characterized by a lot of discussions with girlfriends regarding the man’s deficiencies, as well as a decent amount of wonderment and awe as the female discovers The Male is not at all perfect (and may actually have some sort of disability, as evidenced by the fact that he can’t find stuff that’s 3 inches from his forehead and leaves hair in the bathroom sink after shaving). This stage also involves the surfacing of all other incomprehensible tendencies, causing the female to realize she’s going have to fix this character if they’re ever going to make it. And therefore, she begins to WORK, which of course results in long, long, long discussions, unreasonable bickering, maybe therapy but for sure tears, cajoling, threatening, flailing and general malaise, and, most likely, the arrival of an infant or two.

Honest Valentines at this stage may look like this:

And then, if the couple in question makes it past Stage 2, they enter Stage 3 (years 6 – ?), commonly known as the “Well Obviously You are not Going to Change and I’m Tired of Fighting so I’ve Accepted you and your Weirdness” Stage. (Yes, these stages have awkwardly long titles. Not particularly catchy, I know. Don’t blame me. I didn’t make it up.) Oh wait.

As you can see, this is something of a deal-breaker stage – since it’s pretty much Stage 3 or Stage Bye-Bye. Stage 3 is characterized by a lot of glaring but less complaining, fewer divorce threats and a surface-level acceptance of small, irritating habits (such as buying odd gadgets that will never ever be used EVER, or eating onions before bed). It also involves some strange compromises (“Honey, if you pick up your bath towel from the floor every day, I’ll start squeezing the toothpaste from the bottom.”) and subtle retaliation (as opposed to the long, long, long discussions in stage 2 (or therapy)). On the plus side, this Stage results in a weird peace and vague sense of serenity and, occasionally, some intense relief  regarding the fact that you didn’t throw in the towel when things got rough (and therefore, thank god, you don’t have to deal with these hoodlum children alone). Women in this stage feel a little like badass survivors of some great calamity, like a tsunami, or fire. “We almost didn’t make it, kids. We really had to work HARD to make this marriage work. Ah, but look at us now…”

And we feel a little victorious. And yeah, alright, I’ll say it: A little in love.

Enough of the sappy crap.

Real valentines in this stage may look something like this:

And with that, let me just say: Happy freaking Valentine’s Day, ladies.

xoxoxoxo

Yesterday, Ava came home very upset. Like really upset. She was emotional and distraught and seemed overwhelmed and lost.

She explained that she had been betrayed by her friends…her “friends.” Not only had there been some flakiness surrounding the science fair (which Ava takes so seriously it sort of alarms me), she found out that two of the girls at her slumber party had snuck into her room and read her diary, after telling Ava to “please leave” because they were “talking about something private.”

She was absolutely betrayed and could not make sense of it on any level: why would they lie? Why would they hurt her like that? Don’t they really care about her? Aren’t they her friends?

As she asked these questions I did my regular searching-for-the-right-thing-to-say routine, in which I inevitably realize I am not cut out for this shit and should not be trusted with somebody’s emotional development.

I listen to her feelings and empathize and commiserate. I feel the urge to say supportive, encouraging, hoo-rah good-mothering comments to her, to boost her spirits and make her feel better…but I just can’t. I can’t get them out. I hear them in my head: “Oh, maybe they were having a bad day. Be a bigger person. Look for the good in them.” Blah blah fucking blah.

But just like in The Stuffed Seal Incident, I can’t bring myself to say them, mostly because that crap never worked for me or helped me and it pretty much always just pisses me off. All that positive self-talk crap.

So instead, I say the truth.

“Ava, people suck. People are self-interested and self-centered. Every person, no matter who they are or how much they love you or you love them or how good they seem, WILL, inevitably, at some point, let you down. They will fail to meet your expectations. They will hurt you. This is not because they are bad people, but rather because they are human. And as humans, they are flawed.”

Maybe that seems pessimistic or negative or defeatist, but I don’t really think it is. And here’s why: because it’s true.

It’s reality.

And the truth, in my opinion, is where the freedom lies and real growth can occur.

All that positive self-talk just polishes my anger into something more palatable, or covers it up long enough that I forget it’s there. Ah, but the truth. The truth changes things.

Now if any of you have a close relationship to a human being who has never once failed to meet your expectations, please let me know and I will adjust my theory…but as far as I can tell, not a single human has ever lived on this planet without royally fucking up at least once, injuring the people close to him or her in the process.

I’ve done it. Sometimes I don’t even know I’ve done it. I let people down without even knowing they expected something of me. I’ve been so lost serving my own interests that I don’t even realize my friend needed me. So I’m an asshole consciously and an asshole unconsciously.

That’s actually kind of impressive.

Anyway I was on a roll, so I kept going. “Ava, this doesn’t mean we just roll over and accept the way people treat us without question. We get to choose who is in our lives and who isn’t, and you can cross those girls out immediately if you want, and with reason, but either way, the sooner you let go of the expectation that friends and acquaintances are going to treat you in thoughtful, considerate ways all the time… the sooner you’ll be a happier person.”

And she thought about this. And thought. And thought. And finally said “Yeah, I see that, because I hurt people all the time and get mad and feel bad about it. But I just want them to see that they were wrong.”

And so I said something to her that changed my life when a good, [very mean, very real] friend said it to me: “Well, would you rather be right or would you rather be free?”

She looked at me like I was insane.

But I think she got it one some level…

I chose not to go on, chose not to explain that it’s freedom from bitterness and resentment and pain – freedom from that aching feeling that comes because the world just won’t do what I want and nobody behaves and no matter how hard I try, you fail me. You hurt me. You let me down.

And I think they won’t. But they will.

And I will.

Because we’re human.  That’s what we do.

Oddly, when I see that, when I see the humanity in the other person, when I see that they are just like me, I am finally able to forgive them, to move on with a clearer head and less pain. Or at least it doesn’t last quite so long.

And maybe I will walk away, ultimately. And that’s cool. But whether I choose to love them despite their flaws or kick ‘em to the curb, I don’t have to carry that sickening feeling of betrayal, of deep-seated hurt – because I wanted you to be something you literally cannot be. (The Person Who Never Lets me Down.)

I don’t know.

It took me 30 years to learn these lessons. Just kinda hoping she gets it a little earlier.

But seriously, what kind of asshat kid reads somebody else’s DIARY? Little bastards.

So occasionally I come across some little quiz or whatever “helping” people determine if they’re ready to become a parent. This is, of course, totally ridiculous, because there is no possible way anybody could ever be “ready” for the train wreck that is New Parenthood.

You can’t prepare for that. (Neither the joys nor the horrors.)

Go ahead, read BabyCenter and Parenting Magazine, buy all the books, let them lull you into a space of confidence and security…but get ready to fall EVEN HARDER once that kid comes and you realize they sold you LIES.

I repeat: there is no preparing for this.

There are, of course, our super over-achieving types who make spreadsheets to record poops and pees and have money coming out their ears and therefore buy all the gear and DO EVERYTHING PERFECTLY – but, in my experience, those are usually the people who suffer the most, especially when their kid turns out to be the most non-spreadsheet-adaptable human on the planet. Invariably, they end up with the kid that defies all logic, routine or reason.  They have the freaking nutjob baby who sleeps like one hour a week and wails the rest of the time. (While watching Baby Einstein and doing flashcards, of course.) By the way, Baby Einstein is like the only thing my baby will watch for more than 12 seconds…SCORE!

But if a checklist actually existed that may actually help people determine whether they are ready for day-to-day, on-the-ground parenthood, it would (in my [dark, twisted] opinion) look something like this:

Are you ready to be a parent? Let’s find out! Mark all the items on the below list that are true for you. If you choose 20 or more, you’re ready for parenthood!

1. I only like to sleep when other people tell me I can sleep.
2. I enjoy using the restroom in the company of others.
3. I like poop.
4. I like poop on my hands.
5. If I were to, say, find silly putty stuck between my bed sheets, I’d think it was cute.
6. My greatest pleasure in life is driving humans around in a hurry.
7. I believe money should be spent on character-building activities of questionable value and Starbucks.
8. Quarterly sex will suffice.
9. I enjoy receiving unsolicited advice from toothless women who smell like gin.
10. I also like it when they touch my belly.
11. I seek opportunities to engage in outrageously high-stakes activities for which I am totally underprepared.
12. If I could, I would wash approximately 12,000 garments a day.
13. I like guilt.
14. I like constant talking and a low hum of irritating, indecipherable noise.
15. I prefer my tits closer to my knees.
16. When walking around my house barefoot, I throw food and small toys on the ground because I like the feel of them between my toes.
17. I prefer to work during vacations.
18. In restaurants, I like to walk around every four minutes and eat my food standing up while chasing a squirrel on crack.
19. My goal in life is to act every day exactly like my mother even though I think I’m not.
20. I’m okay with never seeing the floor of my car again.
21. I’m ready to want to stab myself in the eye with a toothpick on a sometimes hourly basis then somehow, at the end of the day, cry because I realize my life won’t always be like this.
22. In short, I’M READY FOR MADNESS.

Now why don’t they write THAT on BabyCenter?

So a few different things have come up lately that have made me think about the whole concept of judging others.

Or, perhaps, not judging others.

People tend to say that a lot: “Don’t judge.”

Or “I don’t judge.” This statement is, in my opinion, one of the hugest piles of steaming bullshit around.

And, most of the individuals I’ve run into who claim “not to judge” are the most raging judgmental people on the planet – they just keep it all inside – obsessed with the bullshit political correctness movement, wherein we all judge each other silently, but violently, and stand from our pedestal of righteousness and superiority since we “know how to talk properly and respectfully and non-judgmentally.”

Which is of course, in itself, a judgment.

Because as far as I can tell there is no way to avoid judging others. It’s like an auto-pilot reaction to life. I have been conditioned by my social, economic, cultural backgrounds to perceive the world in a certain way. I’ve developed ideas along the way regarding right or wrong, educated or not, classy or not – the list continues. I’ve been told things from a very young age by parents and teachers and the media, things that wedge themselves into the crevices of my mind whether I want them there or not.

I can’t just THINK that shit away. I can’t just erase them with positive self-talk and Oprah.

In my experience, the best thing to do with the judgments I have is to admit that they’re there, face them directly, and remain as willing as I possibly can to let them go should information come my way that negates them.

I try to keep my mind open.

And usually, that’s how it works for me. I think I know something. I think I know the way it should be done and oh yeah I get all self-righteous in that knowledge, until life hands me something in startling opposition to that belief – and I realize, in a flash…I was wrong.

Boom. Judgment gone.

I think that’s why so many people who haven’t had children are so judgmental of people’s parenting approaches. They haven’t had kids yet so they still think it’s easy and straightforward and universal.

And then they have kids and they’re like “Holy fuck I didn’t realize it was like THIS.”

Or they remain judgmental pricks and we hate them.

But after thinking about this for awhile, I think when people are saying “don’t judge” they actually mean “don’t condemn.”

And that I think is some sound advice. If I reject people because they’re doing something I don’t agree with, if I shun them or silence or ignore them, well then I’ve entered the land of closed-mindedness and I am sure to stay swimming forever in the pool of my own judgments and hate.

I have all kinds of people in my life who do things on a regular basis that make me wonder if they have some sort of mental disorder. But I freaking love them anyway. My love blows past my ego’s need to judge them. I watch my judgment come up. Maybe I say something, maybe I don’t. But I try to just go back to loving them. Because usually there’s more to a person than this one thing that really irritates me. And I know that. And I try to hold on to that.

Unless that thing is really fucking BIG. In that case, we pretty much can’t be friends. I’m not Mother Theresa, you know. (as shocking as that may strike you.)

Maybe I shouldn’t write my judgments on my blog. Maybe I should hold them all inside in case they are disproven at a later date.

Maybe. But I don’t think so. It’s way too much fun to let that shit go sometimes.

And if it turns out I’m wrong, holy shit won’t that sting even more! And then I get to get on my blog and tell all you guys “Oh, yeah. About that. I don’t think I believe that anymore.”

And that’d be okay.

And here’s the other thing. Some behavior should be judged. We have to use our brains to look critically at what this world is selling us, right? We gotta question, always question.

If somebody is beating their child they should be judged. Right? What if we just said “oh, well, let’s have an open mind and support them in their beliefs?”

Or Martin Luther King, Jr. Was he not judging? Was he not taking a look at this society and analyzing it like a jeweler looks at a diamond, assessing what was right and wrong, but with the eyes of the open-minded and loving and curious?

He judged, but he didn’t condemn. And his love made him profoundly effective.

No, I am not comparing myself to MLK, Jr. Um, that would be ridiculous. He changed our country. I say “fuck” a lot and whine about inappropriate kid clothing and guinea pigs.

He came to my mind because he embodies what I believe to be the epitome of a free-thinking, resistant, powerful individual. He was an excellent “judge.” He looked, he knew it was wrong, he worked with great power and determination to change it. And he did it out of love for all humanity. Though he could have, he didn’t condemn whites. Instead he loved people with such depth that he could see the universal suffering caused from hate and racism, and from that place of acceptance and love he resonated with people’s souls.

Yeah, I don’t do that. I also don’t love everybody.

But I do try, in my own small, unimportant, slightly pathetic way, to say things honestly as I see them, to stand up for a few things I believe to be true and right and real. I feel a little fear (but I do it anyway) every time I write a post that exposes myself deeply or opinions that may be controversial.

But I’ve never had the gift of small talk or indirectness or beating around the proverbial bush. Consequently, I am really good at removing my foot from my mouth.

I am also so used to being wrong it isn’t funny. (Although as you all know, I still get worked up sometimes when others attempt to tell me I’m wrong. My ego stomps its foot screaming obscenities in the corner of the room, and I write pissed off retaliatory blog posts.) That’s because I’m also, quite often: childish, self-centered, egotistical and shallow. I get hurt feelings and want to retaliate and prove myself. Why? I don’t freaking know.

Because.

Because I’m a human. With judgments and disasters and successes and failures and tantrums.

I will try to love you. But I will let you down. I will contradict myself. I will walk out too soon or stay too long or speak the wrong words.

But at least I’m speaking them. And that, somehow, feels right.