Entitlement Eats Your Candy Just Because it’s Yours

This week, my workplace was beside itself, tied in knots (just as uncomfortable as it sounds) trying to entertain a Fairly Big Wig who was visiting. Lucky us! He and his entourage were actually in my part of the office yesterday. Sadly, I had to go to a doctor’s appointment so I missed it but here’s how part of the visit transpired.

Fairly Big Wig: Hey, nice banner.
Cohort: Yeah, hey that is nice.
My boss: It’s our charitable campaign banner.
Cohort: Can we have it?

OK, pause here. Are you staring at your screen, afraid to even blink because you think you might have just had a stroke? Are you replying in your head, No, you idiot, you can not HAVE IT. Why would you say that? Me too. That’s what I said when I had this story told to me. But of course, they are Fairly Big Wigs. So –

My boss replied: I guess so.

And then the banner (trust me, it was ugly and completely not worth putting in your suitcase and taking back to, um, your head office) was removed from the wall, where another tall co-worker and I had thumbtacked it two weeks ago, folded neatly and presented to Fairly Big Wig and his Cohort, who, I am presuming, smiled broadly because dude! I was totally joking but they GAVE IT TO US! We CAN do anything we want! and then they went on their merry way.

This anecdote merely adds insult to the already fairly grievous injuries my co-workers and I have sustained at the hands of this particular Fairly Big Wig over the past couple of months. But oh! how I laughed; a bitter, jaded laugh. I realized that I am all out of anger and disbelief where my job is concerned. Nothing will surprise or shock me (except maybe a new administrative assistant who knows her ass from a copy of Wordperfect). By default, then, I am becoming that person with the Very Bad Attitude, the one who eggs her colleagues on, “What are they going to do, FIRE YOU?” The who has no loyalty to her job at all, only to the colleagues she likes and everyone else can piss up a rope.

Because when what you see at the top, at the pinnacle of your organization, is a bunch of assholes all lined up and what you see lining the path to the top is people with their tongues out, well, it doesn’t really make you want to climb that mountain so much, you know?

Ah, bad imagery. So!

Today at Superstore, Halloween costumes were 75% off so I bought a huge fuzzy dog costume for Trombone. I justified this – in light of my recent pontifications on ready-made costumes – in two ways:

1. At this time next year I will be entertaining a 2.5 year old and a 7 month old. Fuck creativity. Huzzah!
2. It was $2.44! That’s only $0.07 more than a box of Goldfish crackers!

I put it in his stroller while I shopped and he patted its head and told it toddler secrets. When we got home, I put it in the storage locker in our garage. I wonder if I could send myself an email from the future, telling me I have a dog costume in the storage locker. I have already, this year, made the mistake of thinking I had no socks and buying new socks, when in fact all my socks were in a bin in the garage. Oh the bright side, now I have LOTS of socks. I wonder if the Fairly Big Wig needs any socks. I could send him some.

In closing, my awesome new doctor is not just awesome but fluent in French and a really great teacher. It almost makes me want to go to medical school but I fear, based on the students I have been exposed to at work and at the doctor’s office, that I am not cute enough. Seriously, it’s like Grey’s Anatomy come to life.