Shouldn’t this mom be snuggling the towhead toddler or, like, patting him on the head or using Kleenex and mom juice to clear away some of the crud under his nose? Instead, she keeps talking while the child lurches toward us, who, despite his stuffy nose, is drawn to the aroma of the pizza.
Merck girl and I lock eyes. We both know what’s next.
A second later, the child drops his sticky hammer on the rep’s pizza boxes and sneezes directly into her hair. The word “juicy” comes to mind, but it doesn’t aptly describe the tsunami of awful now clinging to the rep’s neatly arranged Rachel-from-Friends cut. I silently empathize as she does her best to only exhale and then I divert my attention. Sorry, honey. It’s every germaphobe for herself in here.
To avoid meeting her gaze, and thus laughing myself out of the waiting room, I pick up the first non-Highlights magazine I can find. My appointment with Dr. Bronner was supposed to be half an hour ago. Most likely I won’t see him until he’s done enjoying his Merck-provided (hot zone) pizza luncheon, so I’ve got plenty of time to read.
I tab past all the advertisements for sexy, strappy shoes. Wish I could get away with those at work. My sartorial choices at this time of year are limited to whatever kind of pantsuit best covers up the utilitarian waterproof boots I’m forced to wear while trudging through a million snowy parking lots every day.153 If the sidewalk salt didn’t destroy them, surely I’d lose a toe to frostbite.
Yet I can’t complain because I’ve got a ton of freedom as a recruiter, as opposed to my early days here at Great Plaines HMO when I was shackled to my desk. The only time I left my cube was for lunch, but I was even more financially tapped out then and had to brown-bag it every day, so I never got to explore the city. I had no idea where to find a decent restaurant, but I could absolutely tell you which lunchroom microwave was the best.154
I’m on my third position here at the HMO. Technically, this job isn’t much different from being a negotiator, but my new bonus structure is a lot more motivating. That’s why I’m here, enduring an hour of screaming—and possibly catching tuberculosis—for an extra two hundred bones.
When I was a negotiator, I didn’t go off-site nearly as much as I do now. Sure, I attended the occasional hospital meeting, but they were hardly every day. Since I became a recruiter, I’m practically a vapor trail. We recruiters are out in the field so much we don’t even have our own desks. We have to share them,155 which is only a problem during our staff meetings on Wednesdays when everyone’s in-house. Lately it’s become a contest to see who can get there the earliest to stake out the prime real estate next to the copy machine. Last week my two work best friends (David and Tim) and I all arrived before six fifteen a.m. After Christmas vacation, you can bet your ass I’ll be there by six a.m.
The receptionist calls Merck girl to the back and she bolts away from Towhead and his Ski Pants of Death. His mom remains completely unaware of anyone else’s presence because, damn it, Maria Elena is just not scouring the grout like she used to and this will affect156 her holiday bonus. I continue to peruse my magazine because it’s going to be a few more minutes. Also, the doctor’s a lot less likely to join my network if I start administering diamond suppositories to his patients’ parents.
Towhead’s mom gives her phone companion an icy laugh before murmuring, “Maria Elena isn’t smart enough to know she’s making less than minimum wage.”
Flipping pages keeps me from balling my hands into fists.
Flip, flip, flip.
I like the pocketbook ads because they inspire me to work harder. I spend a lot of time daydreaming about what kind of purse I’ll buy once I get my first big bonus. The canvas bag I’m carrying has seen better days, plus it makes me look like a college student. I need something more professional to be taken more seriously.
All the seasoned recruiters have Coach bags, so they figure prominently into my fantasies. Coach is good because their bags aren’t so fancy that the doctors notice them and resent the “big money” we make at the insurance company.
Swear to God, if one more physician bitches about how “rich” I’m getting, I’ll probably start swinging. Last week I had an obgyn crying to me about how our reimbursement rates were bankrupting him. Then I watched him drive away in his brand-new S-class Mercedes with personalized plates while I climbed into my old Toyota Tercel with the dent I can’t afford to repair.
I always want to tell these doctors, Listen up, I make $26,000 a year, and 80 percent of that goes to rent and transportation. Every month I do the reverse-bill lottery, figuring out which payment I can get away with skipping. For heaven’s sake, I’m carrying a bag I got free at a trade show! If anyone at the insurance company is making big money, it ain’t me.
Shoot, half the furniture in my apartment came from the alley in my neighborhood. And earlier this spring, I specifically scheduled an appointment to coincide with the town’s heavy trash day. My friend David and I Dumpster-dove in front of the homes of the very doctors with whom we’d just met. Bet they’d change their tune if they spotted us snapping up their old cross-country skis and worn luggage.
I continue to idly browse until I see an automobile advertisement. The car doesn’t interest me—the Tercel157 is okay—but there’s something about the copy that intrigues me. If I remember my college Italian, one phrase means “To live life like you’re in the movies.”
Huh. What would that be like?
The movie version of my life definitely doesn’t include inhaling lunch from the dollar menu while trying to navigate a stick shift through rush-hour traffic to get to my next appointment. Or sitting around a shouty, disease-ridden office in unventilated boots and damp polyester pants, hoping to score enough cash to bring the gas bill current.
Do they make movies about people who work ’til nine every night?158 And who have so much paperwork in their tiny dining room-home office that they have to put all their beloved books in storage so the stacks can be housed on the shelves instead? Who’s camping out in line to see that?
I want to live my life like it’s a movie, but I have no idea how. The closest I’ve come so far is the time last spring when Fletch and I ditched work and went to a ballgame at Wrigley Field. I remember I got a really cute army green Cubs bucket hat that day when I applied for a credit card. Too bad I didn’t catch a pop fly like in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. That’d be movielike, right? I didn’t cruise up Lake Shore Drive in a convertible, chiffon scarf floating in the breeze like in My Best Friend’s Wedding, nor did I plow through Daley Plaza all Jake and Elwood-style like in The Blues Brothers. Actually, I didn’t do anything else exciting that day and as soon as the game was over, I went home and did more work because I felt so guilty.
Come to think of it, I didn’t even get approved for the credit card.
Damn.
I bet the skinny soccer mom lives her life like a movie, only she’s not the heroine. She’d be the one making coats out of puppy fur or causing Sandra Bullock to cry over her lack of grout-scrubbing prowess.
I shrug and close the magazine. Wouldn’t matter if I knew how to live my life like a movie because I couldn’t even afford a ticket for admission.
Pretty (Average) Woman
(Utilitarian Snow Boots)
Jim, David, and I are on our way to the Starbucks on the other side of the Randolph Street Bridge. It’s Wednesday and we’ve already claimed our desks. Since no one else will be in the office for another two hours, we figure we can spare the time to grab a coffee.
The bridge is steel and it’s made up of thousands of tiny metal grids. I like being on it in the summer because I can see straight down to the very river that made me want to work at this company. (The great irony is I didn’t discover access to the grassy area adjacent to the water until I was too busy to consider taking my lunch down there.)
I always get a walking-on-air vibe when I go over this bridge. Little different story in the winter, though. The grids prevent ice from forming, but the unfortunate side effec
t is that when the wind blows, it has nowhere to go except directly up my skirt. My feet are warmed because they’re protected by thick, ugly boots, but my thighs are freezing. It only takes us a minute to cross the bridge, but by the time we reach Starbucks, I’m a total Jen-cicle.159
Tim and David both get cups of drip coffee. They add sugar and cream at the condiment bar while I wait at the service counter for my mocha. My boots squeak on the floor as I shift my weight from one leg to the other in an attempt to defrost myself from the waist down while the hyper-caffeinated barista grills everyone in line about their New Year’s resolutions. When he gets to me, I grit my teeth before saying I resolve to drink more Starbucks. He laughs and moves on.
As soon as we leave, I kind of explode. “I hate that so much!”
Tim is puzzled. “Then why’d you order it?”
“No, not my mocha, dummy. The barista—did you hear him? He asked me about my New Year’s resolution,” I huff.
“What of it?” David asks, slurping the excess coffee off his lid.
“Doesn’t that irritate you?” I demand.
David and Tim exchange one of their Jen’s-got-PMS-again glances. “Should it?” David, the mellower of the two, asks.
“Hell, yes! I’ve never even met that guy. I could understand him asking that if I had, but I haven’t.”
Tim nods and takes a giant step away from me. “I see your point.” David nods vigorously.
“Both of you stop patronizing me. Let me put it like this—say your job is to bag my groceries, or ensure the check I deposit gets credited to the right account, or make my coffee, then my resolutions are none of your goddamned business and are certainly not small-talk fodder.”
David turns to Tim. “How was your Christmas?”
“Don’t change the subject; I’m serious! This line of questioning is a violation of the social contract.”
“Clearly,” Tim replies. He and David begin to walk faster.
I chug along behind them, trying to catch up. “The thing is, resolutions are rarely about what we already find kind of awesome about ourselves, like, I resolve to continue to be a great parent or I resolve to keep visiting my senile grandma in the nursing home as often as I do or—”
David interrupts, “Or I resolve to not garbage pick.”
“I resolve to stop drinking coffee with certifiably insane people,” Tim supplies.
“My point is resolutions generally have to do with what we don’t like about ourselves, as in I want to lose weight (because I’m too fat) or I pledge to get organized (because my life is a huge mess) or I’m going to save money (because my spending is out of control). Therefore, when you, a perfect stranger, ask me about my resolutions, you’re basically asking me to lay all my flaws bare and it’s incredibly presumptive and rude, especially when the person asking is in no position to help me achieve whatever it is I resolve to do.”
As usual, Tim argues the counterpoint. “You answered his question. By giving him an answer, aren’t you part of the problem by encouraging him to do the one thing you hate?” We get to our building’s revolving glass door. David steps aside so I can go through first. Once in, we stamp all the slush off our boots. We go up the escalator to get to the main floor and then select the bank of elevators to take us to fifteen.
“I answered because I didn’t want him spitting in my mocha. And I didn’t want to give the tired old I resolve not to make any resolutions, yuck, yuck, yuck response. Not everything has to be a fight with me, you know.”
David and Tim both clear their throats and look at the ceiling.
“It doesn’t! I don’t fight with any of my doctors, now do I?” I challenge.
At the same time, David and Tim both answer, “Yet.”
I sigh. “You are two enormous bags of douche. I’m going to start calling you Massengill”—I point at Tim—“and Summer’s Eve.”
“Okay, okay,” David concedes. “Then riddle me this, Batman—the next time the cashier at the grocery store asks you about your resolutions, what are you going to say?”
I consider this for a moment while Tim pulls out his magnetic card to unlock the door. We all pass through and I finally reply, “I’m going to say I resolve to be cognizant enough to spot potential problems within myself and to begin to work on them immediately, without making a public declaration or waiting to start the improvements on an arbitrary date. And yes, I would like my milk in a bag.”
We’re arranging ourselves in adjacent desks and booting up our laptops by the time I thaw from our trip across the bridge. “Hey, Jen,” Tim asks, “what are you thinking about doing with your bonus when it finally comes?”
“Umm . . . probably take care of some bills, buy a real purse, maybe pay off my car note? Why?”
He replies, “You ought to consider taking a vacation. Like, a long vacation. To a happy place.”
I roll my eyes. “Maybe I’ll do just that, Massengill.”
We’re well into spring now, but I can’t get the idea of living life like it’s a movie out of my head. And even though I hate when strangers ask about my resolutions, I believe in the power of making them.
Here goes—even though I’m a few months late—I resolve to live my life like a movie for the remainder of this year.
Now . . . how do I go about accomplishing this?
People in movies seem to live better lives when they get make-overs. I bet I need an image overhaul. Fortunately, I don’t have to have sex with Richard Gere for money to start the process. I have a secret weapon I’ve inadvertently been saving for a special occasion—my corporate American Express card.
I’ve had this card since I went to Philly last year for a month of intensive training. I’ve never bought anything on it not directly related to a business travel expense, even though I’m allowed to use it. The numbers on it are still black because I’ve pulled it out of my wallet so few times. I’m not afraid to touch it, but this is a card I have to pay in full each month or else I’d get in trouble with both Amex and my employer. Luckily, I get my bonus in a few weeks, so if I want to use it? I can.
I assess myself in the mirror hanging on the outside of my bathroom door.
Hair? Blackish, curly, sort of coarse,160 with a few too many grays to ignore. (How did I manage to go straight from campus to corrective color?) I don’t take care of it like I used to. When I was in school and I had a profitable night waiting tables, I’d splurge on the fancy salon across town. Sometimes I’d get a gloss put in my hair and sometimes I’d have it straightened and I’d always buy the very best product to put in it. Except when it was jammed back in a mandatory ponytail, my hair was down to my elbows, silky and beautifully layered.
For now, my cut is unremarkable. I’ve been going to Great Clips exclusively since graduation and it shows. (Being salaried has meant no profitable nights and very little splurging.) I went really short once I started working because I thought that would give me some professional gravitas. Instead, I just looked like a gym teacher. I’ve grown it back to a shoulder-length bob but it’s shapeless, except for whenever it’s humid out. Then it turns into a giant wedge of pizza.
My grocery store hair dye has done me no favors, either. There was a purple incident a couple of months ago when I opted for the sale brand. (Let us not speak of it again.) I’ve been running dark rinses through it lately. The gray’s gone . . . but so’s all the shine and depth. The color is as flat and black as if I went over it with a Sharpie.
My flat black hair only serves to highlight how pasty I am. I haven’t been to a tanning bed for ages and my skin’s practically translucent, except for where I’ve broken out since I used up all my Clinique products and replaced them with stuff from the drugstore. Upon closer inspection I can confirm it: my cosmetics give me the appearance of being neither wet nor wild. (Got a bit of a vampire vibe going on, though.)
I swing open the ratty folding doors in my microscopic bedroom and I feel sad at the sight of all my stuff. My closet is where ill-fitting su
it jackets and cheaply cut trousers go to die. There’s not one item in here that quickens my pulse, making me excited to get dressed.
Back in school I could dress casually every day. Although I’d occasionally embrace a trend—e.g., leopard print—I always defaulted to wearing preppy items . . . nicely cut khakis, ice-creamy-colored polos, striped rugby shirts, argyle sweaters, loafers, etc. These items made me happy because I felt good when I wore them.
Clean, simple lines flatter my figure most. However, since I graduated I’ve eschewed fit for price. Discount stores like Marshalls and TJ Maxx and Stein Mart have been my main source of staples and I’m seeing what a mistake that’s been. I’ve gone for quantity over quality. I’ve screwed up by buying three cheap acrylic sweaters rather than one well-crafted twinset. I no longer buy the item that makes me feel the prettiest—I just get whatever has been marked down the most. This has to stop.
I glance at the floor. All my shoes are boxy, flat, and ugly, which makes perfect sense because they pair so nicely with my dowdy wardrobe. I see my big black snow boots taking up valuable floor real estate. They represent everything that’s wrong with my wardrobe, and ergo, my life right now. There’s no color, there’s no style, there’s just utility.
But I feel a change coming on—winter’s over and I realize I don’t have to wear what’s practical. Going forward, I should opt for pointy, heeled, and pretty. Maybe it’s time for style to trump comfort.
A makeover will likely help my career because if I feel better about myself, it will translate into my job. And if this were a movie, I’d start the process the second the thought occurred to me.
Pretty in Plaid: A Life, A Witch, and a Wardrobe Page 20