The BOSS OF ME blog

Once upon a time I had a boss. He was a really cool boss; I think I’ll call him ‘Brent.’ Hell, let’s pretend we’re ‘with-it’ and call him ‘myBoss Brent.’ myBoss Brent used to say, “I hate boring.” He also used to say, “I’m a Doberman in a Poodle’s body.”

Will either one of these statements make me a lot of money? I sure hope so. This fortune cookie message from last nights’ Chinese take out is currently shaping up to be my best lead on a source of income. Now, figuring out which friend and remembering what the hell they said, is all that’s standing between me and my loot. myBoss Brent also used to routinely say “I love you in a non-harassing and company approved diverse sort of way.” Once in a while he’d get reckless and leave out the harassing/diverse part. He said a lot of things and I can’t help thinking, “Is he my ‘friend’ the fortune cookie is referring to?” I began racking my brain trying to figure out who this friend could be and ultimately realized: I don’t have any friends.

You must be a complete loser

Hey, hey, hey! We’re not talking about my parenting aptitudes here. I have a perfectly logical reason for not having any friends. Well ‘logical,’ might not be the right word. The opposite of logical is probably a more accurate descriptor.

On the day of my wedding, I looked down the long harvest table at the people gathered and I remember thinking, “Wow, did I really just go through with that?” (Just joking!) After that, I thought, “Aside from my family, are all of these people from work?” I counted three former bosses, and the overwhelming remainder of non-relatives were past and present colleagues. Why did bosses and colleagues outnumber all other wedding guests on my side of the aisle? I’m not sure, but if my pension kicked in after hours worked, instead of age, I could legitimately retire right now. Needless to say, I spent a preposterous amount of time at work over the last 20 years and by default, I spent a lot of time with the people I worked with. I also like to talk about work. A lot. And co-workers are good for that. Hell! I even let them talk once in a while.

With a passion for shop talk and long hours, establishing strong bonds with those I worked with was inevitable. Our shared commitment to eradicating the word boring from our vocabularies kept us entertained and focused on the task at hand and our relationships soon morphed into something more than your standard co-worker rapport. We skipped the typical friend-zone pleasantries altogether, and soon we were trying to find spouses for our single colleagues – well myBoss Brent was.

Wait, what?

With a single-minded focus on establishing my career, you might wonder how I ever managed to get married in the first place. If you happened to work for myBoss Brent, it was pretty simple actually, inevitable even. I’ve listed a few of his core strategies for matchmaking below: 

• During business meetings with suppliers and clients Brent would ask: “Are you single? Because my employee Christie is.” His theory was that you just never know where a potential ‘love match’ may develop – I didn’t even have to be at the meeting. Co-workers who happened to be in attendance would warn me that Brent was trying to hook me up with a 60-year-old accountant from Idaho, again.
• In a full elevator he would loudly proclaim to the group “Are you in love with Christie?” Because really, you just can’t know for sure until you yell it out in an elevator full of strangers, two company VP’s, and an ultra-conservative CEO.
• Brent would leave his single male employees’ business cards for the waitress on the table after lunch. Then, with his hand in the shape of a mutated flip phone held up to his ear and the other pointed at his lunch partner’s back, he’d mouth the words “call him.”
• He would spend countless hours scouring newspapers, resume photos and the Internet, to find his single employees potential mates. He would then leave clippings of these ‘finds’ strategically placed throughout our offices. Brent clearly didn’t have confidence in my ability to support myself as I usually got the ‘rich 80-year-old-about-to-kick-off guy.’ My younger colleagues would get the more age appropriate and somewhat attractive, car salesmen or realtor-types.

Brent’s random and impulsive implementation of these ‘core strategies’ for matchmaking also ensured that his employees and anyone who came into contact with us were not bored at work, and were generally pretty hysterical, unless you happened to be the victim, I mean, bachelor/bachelorette. Despite and because of Brent’s creative and persistent efforts, my colleagues and I decided we needed to actually participate in our own partner sourcing activities, with the sole objective of finding our own mates before Brent found one for us. After all, I wasn’t particularly excited about the idea of moving to Idaho to marry a 60-year-old accountant or waiting for an 80-year-old geriatric to croak. Buoyed by supportive colleagues and fear, I forced myself out of my work-obsessed stupor and stumbled over to the pub; where I pretended to be a carefree, fun loving, wine guzzling, hot-tubing, skier-chick. (Okay, I only had to pretend some of that stuff). Eventually I found a guy wearing a kilt who was pretending to be an easy-going, people-loving, highland dancer. After a lot of pretending, wine swilling, ski-hill tumbling and one near-miss hot-tub drowning, my future spouse discovered that I was indeed a workaholic. Believing that I was ‘fixable,’ he implemented the uber cliché strategy of doing something that is undoubtedly going to make things worse instead of better, and asked me to marry him.

So that’s how that happened and why…

Former colleagues and bosses infiltrated the wedding party, gave unauthorized speeches, and even attempted to walk me down the aisle. Undaunted by his failed aisle-walking coup, myBoss Brent bribed the MC’s and gave an amusing speech describing me as a Barbie with many outfits: Fashion Barbie for my often outlandish and vast wardrobe, Career Barbie for my obsessive work habits, and Camo Barbie for my propensity for arguing, mostly with him. He also gave my new husband a stuffed company mascot to cuddle with during the late hours I was sure to be working. Now, typically colleagues aren’t in your wedding party, don’t try to walk you down the aisle and don’t make their way across the country after many years apart to be there for you on your special day. And they certainly don’t squeeze themselves into a bridesmaid dress while six months pregnant and ninja wrestle their own dress-hating jellyfish into flower girl attire for a tromp down the aisle. My bosses and colleagues have definitely not been typical and they sure as hell weren’t boring.

We’re Work-Related

Recognizing that we spend more time with our work families than our actual families during our working years, it’s important to work at a place where you respect and genuinely care for the people you work with. Laughter, pranks and spouse hunting, don’t hurt either (well not much). Over the years, my colleagues and I became much more than colleagues or even friends, we became work-related: hence, my ‘no friends’ dilemma. These people are not my friends; they are my family, related to me through work. I have no idea what my ‘friend’ said that’s going to make me a lot of money, so I guess I’ll just keep writing and see what happens.

In hindsight, I did spend way too much time at work over the years, but I don’t regret it for a second. I am work-related to some of the most magnificent people on this planet, and for that I am forever grateful and oh so very rich.

THE END