Unfortunately, the other was closed and spotlessly clean. How was I supposed to know? On the way out, I was futzing around with the trinket I bought, putting my wallet away, and totally lost in my own thoughts, when SMACK!!!##$%#####????????!! I walked right into that door, banging my forehead, nose, and knee.
Fortunately, only my knee actually showed a bruise. The reason I was in the shop in the first place was to find an evening bag to match the dress I was wearing to a holiday party on Saturday hosted by the company Peaches works for. It was a fancy party -- the kind you get your hair done and break out the hooker heels for. A bruise on my face would have totally made the evening bag irrelevant.
I wish I could turn this into some sort of metaphor for you ... Hmmmm, maybe I have not yet lost the gift ... You enter academe innocently enough. You wander around, admire the work around you, try things on for size, narcississtically admire yourself, feel ashamed of the size of your ass (too large or too small -- it's always something!), maybe walk away with a trinket, maybe a piece of paper ... the view out on the street looks so lovely with all those holiday decorations winking and blinking at you ... and then SMACK!!!##$%#####????????!! You walk into the cruel reality that you can't stay any longer but getting out HURTS!
Ouch. I swear, my nose still hurts, bruise or not.
* * * * *
On an unrelated note, have any of you ever heard of UnCollege? We should start something similar for graduate school. Particularly for those of us in the humanities and social sciences, just because we love learning does not mean graduate school is our only option. We should be creatively thinking about ways to pursue knowledge AND have a life, whilst opening doors for ourselves rather than walking SMACK!!!##$%#####????????!! into closed ones.
"break out the hooker heels" - LOVE this. Every woman knows exactly what you're talking about.
ReplyDeleteNo sweat about the door. My issue is tripping over sidewalks...and rugs...and stairs...and my feet.
The part of this post that I'm fixated on is the "holiday party". I'm very envious of companies/organizations that have holiday parties, much less fancy ones. Here in community college land, we get squat. Actually, we might get a student complaint and a reason to come back to the building during break to handle said complaint, but other than that, we get a whole lotta nothin'. You'd think it was cause we were "bad" this year, but I know I've been very "good"...just not to myself.
Those sparkly dresses I keep seeing at Macy's have me dreaming. Some day, I will have a fancy work party to attend and a need to find some new hooker heels. But first, I have to push my way out of the glass door that is academia.
Enjoy the party!
Yes, one day soon you will have a reason to get yourself one of those dresses and some new hooker heels!
ReplyDeleteThe party was actually this past Saturday and was fun. It was at a museum -- one that, if you've been to DC, you've probably been to. So we were eating and drinking and listening to the band, whilst walking around through the exhibits. Good times!
The Petting Zoo has a party, too, next week. But it's much more downscale. Drinks and dinner at a nice but not fancy restaurant/bar.
The thing about work parties, though, is that they're WORK parties. No matter how sparkly your dress or how much you have to drink, ou have to deal with these people again come Monday morning, so it's always wise to exercise a bit of restraint.
Thanks for the warning. This new foray into the non academic world makes me feel like a cultural anthropologist.
ReplyDeleteOMG, I made a comment about people watching and cultural anthropology to somebody at the party, and ze just looked a tme like I was from another planet. Talk about conversation killers among "normal" (i.e. nonacademic) types! See the more recent post after this one about what weirdos we are ...
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