On: Working Urban

On:  Working Urban
Colleen Rogers

Tomorrow I quit working in a blight town, a town with the gravitational pull of stuck.  It is the third such town of my professional life.  It is a town with a nickname that sounds like a prison moniker.  It is a sad boil of a place, a town that is stitch scarred down the middle with the trains that bisect it, annoying any commuter wrapped in the extension cord of its joylessness.  The town’s billboards are of Gentlemen’s Clubs, Earning Money by Recycling, and Social Service Agencies. 

It is a town of contrasts—State-of-the-Art Municipal Buildings aligned with homes of elegant bones in disrepair, like cancerous ballerinas.  The hues of the town are a contrast of government functionality (grey-browns), with the primary colors of New Delhi Yellow, Cranial Lava Red, and Electric Cobalt Blue.  It is a jarring mismatch and a hodgepodge.  Vacant places are moss stained and shredded wheat boarded.  Cramped, unsanitary bodegas sell uninspected food, as do unsavory food stops with cigar stained windows.

The people who live there are like the “Walkers” in Zombie films—they travel about, loud in their crazy, dodging singed potholes and the hazards of snow piles that City has left unaddressed.  They hold on to chain link fences, struggling with the balance of sooty bags as they shuffle home.

I taught children there.  They were hustlers, scrappy and savvy, and somehow older than me.  They knew how to get the best deals on electronic equipment, and all the workarounds and scams in life that I was devoid of requiring.  We gave them lots of freebies—free computers, free educational programs and handouts, and free ride scholarships.  I fluxed between feeling grateful for the extra assists they received, and angry that they got things handed to them in the first place. 

The students I taught were talented…every performance I saw them give was more of a “proving” than something spotty-theatrical.  I would wonder why all the show they had was never exhibited daily in class with a consistent, non-stopgap demonstration of progress.

I have given my life to such places, and I am tired.  When I was young, I felt the heart-tug of world-changing efforts, as do my young colleagues now.  They do not understand why, in mid-year, I can no longer stay with the children we serve.  It is just that my tenacious tendons of hope have finally and definitively tight rope snapped.

I can no longer be an enthusiastic advocate, and I realize that what is here cannot be changed.  The visible reality belies the denial of promise, and I find it difficult to watch my colleagues’ earnestness, knowing what assuredly lies ahead.  

Many days now I wish I had had the comfy office.  Piped in music, carpeting beneath my feet, and janitors whisking away each crumb from my desk while I lay asleep at home beneath satin sheets.  The harshness of my professional life has gone largely unappreciated, with work heartily critiqued by bosses who failed to provide minimal support or any bolstering accolades for effort.

I recognize now that the gentility of some souls is not always a match for an urban shore.  Perhaps some of us were not really meant to “change” things in other neighborhoods, or assimilate ourselves into places from which we did not come.  Perhaps we do so with the faulty belief that our lives are somehow more “advanced” than other ways. What if we feel an erroneous compulsion to “instruct” others to follow our lead?  What if this is not the path for many communities to take?  What if the established culture of the homes therein is truly the best life option for the residents?  What if our efforts to assist are in actuality a meddling and unappreciated act of gift giving?

I do not know the answer to these questions.  I only know that I am overwhelmed now at the thought of a life of futile service.  I pray for a sign tomorrow that there might be one small claim of victory that I might observe.   I will need to count this, for now, as a speck of vindication and a solitary moment of joy. 

On: Evaluating Boss Types

On Evaluating Bosses—Which Type Is Yours?

Colleen Rogers

Having had a reasonably long professional career, I have been privy to some interesting administrative supervision.  I have categorized some of my bosses, and have also tried to sort out the reasons they are maddening to work for, and why people eventually leave while under their direction.  I am using the pronoun “HE’ in my descriptors for ease, but these characteristics apply to women admins as well—any gender can wear the chapeau of ass-hattery while running it all.  Check out some of my most obnoxious boss types ever:  

The Bossy Boss—This is the Boss Squared.  If he is an older CEO, he probably runs a family-owned business, or has been long-standing in his supervisory role.  He is resistant to change, and it’s his way or the highway.  He will say things like: “the way we’ve always done it works…I see no need to change things now”.  You know early on that any innovations you imagined when were hired are tabled for your next corporate puddle jump.  If your Bossy Boss is a young Glossy Boss, get ready to prepare for Narcissistic Bossdumb.  He will look the corporate part, but he treats the workplace like a hazing 80’s frat house.  He will steal every idea you promote, claiming each as his own, and is a soulless cheater devoid of any conscience.  He may call his supervisor Daddy. 

The Cross Boss—The Cross Boss is explosive—he time bombs everyone’s decisions, every day, all the time.  His volatility makes the workplace a perpetually stressful environment, with long days required to meet his exacting, impossible standards.  Though he never has the grabber, by working for him, it is guaranteed that you will.   

The Hoss Boss—The Hoss Boss is a Big, Jolly Santa Boss.  It seems like he would make the workplace a joyous corporate wonderland.  Only problem is the Hoss Boss approves and agrees to everything, which leads to departmental infighting and budgetary scrambling.  You always have the sense that a box fiscal dominoes will be what be what is under your annual bonus tree.

The Loss Boss—This boss overspends and leaves staff with job insecurities and threats of biting cutbacks.  He takes a lot of unsound investment chances, and sees himself as a risk-taking innovator, but he makes the corporate leaps without dollar parachutes. 

The Moss Boss—Disorganized and chaotic, it is difficult to manage his corporate work site, the supply warehouse, or shipments and distribution.  He has his own internal management system, one that is completely un-deciphered by anyone else in the company.  You will often find him asleep on the dock, looking homeless, and mumbling I know I left that around here somewhere.  If you prefer a non-addled state of functionality, eat your doughnut elsewhere.  Unless, of course, you don’t mind witnessing the most disgusting five-second rule ever.

The Sauce Boss—This boss imbibes at work…a lot.  Even though he is a big hit at the office holiday party, his drinking makes him unreliable.  He disappears for periods of time, and his good time Charlie salesmanship eventually wears thin with customers when his can’t deliver on his promises.  Covering for him is taxing, and you’re the one who ends up in rehab.

The Toss Boss—This is the Donald Trump of bosses…he utters “your fired”as frequently as your uncle throws horseshoes at a family reunion.  You end up training more people than Daycare teachers, and you eventually stop showing people where the break room is located on their tour of the facility.

Which of these reps your boss?   If you work for any of these types, it's time to quit, or ask for that raise before your next annual review.

Image of Michael Scott from the following link:
https://www.tvfanatic.com/slideshows/17-memorable-tv-bosses/

On: Leavings

On:  Leavings

Colleen Rogers

In a couple of weeks, I am leaving something behind.  On reflection, I know that my choice to go is intellectually correct, but emotionally there is this murkiness, and I withstand an awkward sensation of brave-gulping over a precipice leap.  Like most such decisions for change, "clarity'" is not marked decidedly like Stonehenge.  There are people I am leaving behind that I am fond of, and quirks in the place's pace that I will remember as endearing.  

I wonder why the forks in our roads, even when they have definite directional signs, still trigger a queasy period of adjustment and discomfort.  

 
Every one of these necessitated landline switches...

--it's not the right person for me

--it's not my best fit professionally

--it's not where I want to be living

...is packaged with re-adjustment clocks and periods of self-doubt.  Even after I have made a clear commitment, circled my wagons, and got out of Dodge, I have paid a timeshare of emotional re-organization...

...it is only then that I think of my Red-Headed Boy.

Many years ago, lunar lifetimes past, I fell in love with a Red Headed Boy.  I met him at a wedding reception, and took the setting as a sign of our fated romantic destiny.  We were together for an illustrious and infamous couple of years.  I held no cards toward our love's outcome, and lost every hand paddling to commitment.  Pruned and waterlogged after hanging onto the life raft of the relationship, I finally let go and drifted to shore alone.  I quietly sunbathed, read, and "worked on myself", retreating to an island of self-preservation.  It was then that I met my husband, and (without the foretold melodramatic references) I found an unyielding romance that has shored my world.  And so...

If it had not been for a "leaving", there would have been no "finding"...without the scary cliffs from which we each soar, there would be no elevated life adventures.  It is our leavings, these choices, that shove us toward richly spirited lives.  Our sense of controlling selections may not be genuine in the universe's standards, but our chance-takings fit the quests we need for our determined joy.  Finally, with my own settled contentment, I hope that the Red Headed Boy is happy with his "leaving" as well.       

 

On: Home Improvements with Strangers

Nice guy you don't know (yet) working in your inner sanctum

On: Home Improvements with Strangers
Colleen Rogers

There is nothing more awkward than having people you don't know...do things you have to trust them to do...while they wander around messing in...your own home.  The palpable discomfort that this scenario inspires is nearly horror movie epic.  

"An abode of doom, set recognizable for anyone who lives under at least a non-lean-to shack.  There's appears to be a structural problem therein.  You call some guy you did not find on Angie's List.  He eventually sends a Shady Someone Cousin.  You are desperate, so you do not fact check Pentagon clearance on the Repairman.  Through gauzy curtains you see that he has a truck---they always have a deep bed truck.  You let him in...he mumbles a price.  He starts to work on what is "mysteriously off".  The Handyman freely traverses the freeway of your residence for days turning off water, lights, heat. He doesn't seem to have a clear plan, and you begin to shiver thirsty in the cold and dark, praying for tool pack-up or your own demise, whichever comes first.  You ultimately agree to pay whatever estimate he whisper-panted just to get him off your premises.  He said he did not have just what he needed to finish the job at hand today, so you finally scream for the barbed wire...anything just to complete days of interminable torture."

In actuality, though, the table-turning repair/remodeling experiences I have muscled through in my house have been generally favorable.  With research and referrals, I have been able to work with true professionals and masters of their crafts, and have avoided major mishaps.  I do still have, while undergoing such experiences, an abiding sense of dis-ease when my home suddenly becomes a "work site".  Just as our in-laws used to attest to the fact that "no home is big enough for two families", such as it is with you and your repair/construction team.  There's always that "first-date", "guest-stayed-too-long" bumbling undercurrent.  Yes, your house is their job site...but, it is also where you shower and change, talk to your dog, kiss your spouse (occasionally), and generate the perfume of dinner.  The comfortable breeze of your residence is suddenly construct-errupted; your home now takes on the air of  a Hollywood set.  Your "crew" breaks down the scenery while you self-consciously spit out the lines of your daily routine.  You tweak your behaviors, and you find yourself acting like a "lady who lunches", or a fifties' sitcom Mom.  Unwittingly, you conceal the over-casual nature of your home. You begin to say things to your husband like, "Oh, whatever shall I prepare for dinner this evening, D-a-r-l-i-n-g?"  It is akin to looking behind you when you trip to see what it was that could ever have defeated your surefootedness.  Evidently, it's a Martha Stewart "good thing" to clean up your "residential house" in order to clean up your personal one as well.  Looking forward to my shiny new doors...