relief for a control freak

I wasn't always like this, and it's good that I remember it.

I remember when I was in my twenties and I swore I'd never, ever become so anti-social as my parents. I was punk rock and partied every chance I got. How could one ever decide to say no to a social gathering? Now I know. When all energy is spent during work hours trying to navigate the social fabric of a large organization, the last thing I find myself interested in is dealing with more personalities.

I remember staying up until 4am as a teenager in Buenos Aires. After all, that's just the culture. Dinner is eaten at 9 or 10pm. Lateness is a compliment - 30 minutes is perfect. Early or punctual, and you're regarded as an outsider. And the famous saying is "mañana, mañana." Again, in my twenties, it was natural for me to stay up until bar time - and try to push bartenders to stay open later. I scoffed at my parents and older friends who retired at midnight (or earlier!) to the quiet of their graveyard-like homes. I also swore I'd never need cover-up for under-eye circles or a blow dryer to pretty up my hair, much less any kind of "product" or preening.

Combine the two, and I've got to be up by 6am for an hour-and-half routine of showering, making coffee, putting a lunch together, checking my personal email (it's not allowed on work computers - thank god for the iphone), doing my hair, placing the make-up, and donning the professional work clothes I chose the night before. (God help me how many times the bus is late as I am!) Anyone who knew me before these days has laughed belly-over at the fact that I'm actually becoming a "morning person," while not joyous in the morning I am teaching my brain to actually be congnizant before 10am. So, this leads to enhancing the first point - ugh, people after work hours - and to an early bedtime. At first, because of the steep learning curve, I was like a teenager and required a full night of 8 hours. Then, I adjusted a bit, and could function on 6-7 hours. But now, I'm in a new position (executive assistant - what do they do? "execute!") and again I suffer without a full 8 hours of sleep. This puts me into bed by 10pm - assisted by magic little OTC blue pills.

It didn't use to matter if I had a smear here, a stain there, a forgetfulness over here. But somewhere along the lines - after my days in the non-profit but before grad school, maybe while studying for the GRE - I decided that I couldn't live without some kind of striving for perfection. It's always been inside me, perhaps a bit dormant. My father always tried to instill in us the objective of perfection - that we would never be so, but that the act of trying for it was good enough. In fact, it was perfect to aim for perfection. "Fail to plan, plan to fail." "Proper planning prevents piss poor performance." I also read in a book somewhere, and was confirmed by several dominants with whom I've engaged, that submissives are the biggest control freaks ever. It makes sense in a way. They/we aim to please, strive to fulfill our dominants' needs, want to be better and look better to reflect on them, want to clean the house better or serve the best and most formal way (if we're service subs), want to take as much pain as possible (if we're S&M subs), want to get every little action or position as perfectly as possible (to avoid - or reduce - a punishment, which we may or may not seek anyway), etc.

It's very interesting to me that my colleagues don't know this side of me. They don't understand that even if they tell me XYZ meeting isn't a big deal at all, it means the world to me to get it right. That they say ABC report doesn't mean so much because GHI agency won't really read it - I'm still compelled to complete it perfectly. This can be a hiderence if I don't control the control freak. For instance, boss man tasked me with writing a paper on a certain budget possibility. In the middle of writing it, the woman who previously held my position stopped by and I asked her, "when is it enough?" Of course, she reminded me of what I knew in grad school. "At some point you have to stop researching it and write it. You'll never know everything. You can't. You're too new and you're not omniscient."

So, here it was. A big meeting today. I'd been put in the position to coordinate it. The Commissioner was there and someone tried to introduce us - although we'd been introduced twice and I'd bumped into him in the hallway several times - and he said, "Oh yeah. I already know her. How's it goin'? [something he says EVERY time I see him] I hear you're doing a great job." [The little sub in me rejoiced. Or, perhaps, the girl on the border of X-generation and Y-generation. I'm told my generation and younger seek more validation in their work than previous generations.] "Well, thank you. That's nice." I had nothing more to offer or comment. I was a bit taken aback. My big boss isn't one to offer much feedback at all, thus, I'm only assured that I'm doing a good job by the fact that I'm still in the position that I'm in - would have been transferred if I wasn't working out to his standards.

But then the mistakes. The mistakes came in rolling over the day-long important meeting. One representative wasn't present, although I thought I'd communicated clearly that she was supposed to be there. (Although this doesn't count as a mistake too much as people had told me how problematic she'd been in the past.) Then, the missing last page of Mr. Y's presentation. I went back to the office after the meeting and there it was, the communication from the Commissioner's chief of staff to omit that page. Whew! I had to forward it to him, humbly, just to point out the fact that I was, in fact, not in the wrong and did not neglect my duties, but that there was a missed communication in the end. Same with a following presentation. A page was missing. I have yet to dig up the email communication on that one, but I'm pretty set in knowing that it wasn't my failure.

And that's all new to me. In the good ol' days, I could have let it roll off my back. But in this new spotlight, I feel ever more compelled to make it right, make it excel, make it outstanding. I don't want to meet expectations, and I don't just wan to exceed what people think I can do, I want to knock their fucking socks off. Not that I'm aiming for some superior rise up the ladder, because frankly I don't think I want to be an executive - I'm too lazy. But I want them to think I can gel in the funny moments of the secret downtime between them. I want them to know I can pull anything off and do it superbly.

Sigh. Who is this new person? "Who has kidnapped my sister?" My sister asked. All of this newness even boils down into my dirty sex life. I've been seeing ....

TBC.

and no editing.

A few tips: How Not to be a Moron in the Workplace

Do not talk to yourself in that "people around the table will hear me and ask me about what I'm oohing and aahing" way.

Do not talk out loud to your email.

Do not talk too much personal biz: no one wants to hear that you just decorated your Tampa back yard with columns and hired a plant decorator; no one wants to sing "Happy Birthday" on the phone to your husband because it's his birthday and you are not at home with him to celebrate - plus, it's the middle of the work day, he's at work; no one wants to hear you moan "I don't have anyone to put on the 'Emergency Contacts' list - it's a long story."

Don't be all aggressive in new team work. No one is trying to steal your mojo. No one is going to usurp your job (unless you don't know what "usurp" means). Just chill the fuck out.

Do not have HR discussions with your employee in front of other employees. It's not classy. Take a moment, get up from the team table, walk to the other room, and then tell her/him about time off, comp time, and why there's no paid OT.

Don't eat ice cream for lunch and try to make up excuses for why you're doing it. Just eat your damn ice cream. No one is judging, and if they are - it's all internal, and who the fuck cares?

Don't talk about PMS or bras or pantyhose around your male colleagues. It's inappropriate and weird. Who wants to know about their jock straps, ranging hard-ons that they release in the bathroom, or five o'clock shadow growth?

It does not matter if you're from the South, North, or Far East - "ain't" is not an appropriate word for use in a professional situation.

Grow a pair of balls. Keep it together. Have some class.

What wasn't, now can be; what isn't, just might

I've heard about the transformations people make. Mostly it's from socialist, hippie freak punk kids to conservative, blue-grey haired cranky old people. I very well might be progressing along that line, but I'm doing a rumba as I go.

It's such an odd life.

And I sometimes wonder who's really living it.

I know nothing at all about Scientology but someone told me once that it has something to do with humans believing they're actually aliens inhabiting a human form. Well, I feel that way all the time.

"This can't really be my family."

"Yeah, well, I'm trying out the hair dryer and make-up. Learning to be a woman."

"What would it be like to work for the Federal government?"

It's all so curious. My father and mother are aging before my eyes and annoyingly so. I don't like seeing it. I don't like realizing that I'm actually smarter than my dad right now, more nimble than my mom. But I haven't suffered much. I mean, I've always been this way: grumpy in the morning, independent in the afternoon, and more friendly over wine. I have no office in their house so I'm using the dining room table to set up my computer. (After I Skyped with my friends in Portland who smoke the jones, I realized I needed to be able to find a space where the laptop could face a wall and not have my parents stumble behind me to see Jane and Michael pulling on the bong.) I end up sighing a lot. I breathe a lot when I'm stressed. And there one of them is - "What? What's up?" I call it hovering. Stop hovering, I say. My father stands there, in front of me or next to me. He wants attention. But I refuse to acknowledge him if he doesn't say anything out loud. He needs a volunteer job for fuck's sake. Instead, they've been building an eco-friendly house in the woods 2.5 hours from here. But he won't tell his sisters and mother (who live in town) or his brother or friends. It's a big secret because he's ... well, selfish and sneaky. So they get all busy with this house but don't warn or tell anyone they're packing up and leaving town in a few months. This leaves his sisters to take care of their mother, who lives in an assisted living home. I don't think it's fair to not be open. I don't think it's nice to lie through omission. I find it hard to fake through answers to "What are your parents up to these days?"

But, the fascinating thing is that I'm so much like him. Self-absorbed. Attention hungry. Me first and the gimme gimmes.

My mother putters on. I'm not sure who she is. I can see her eyes frantically searching my face and eyes every time she talks to me. A look of hoping that I'm understanding her. A look of worry that she's boring me. This intense desire to be loved by me. But at the same hand, she'd turn and chop me off any block. She's such a strange person to me. So nervous in company - but I remember when I holed up in Paris and didn't speak to anyone for days and would go out into a party and worry about controlling myself, trying to be a person after forgetting, after living in a den of routine and killing comfort. So, I'm trying to accept her. Love her through my eyes.

But damn it all if I'm not impatient and annoyed with my lack of individual space. I have nowhere to hide during the day when I want to work. What does it matter though? I'm about to sweep away for a job.

The internship in Madison has gone really well, but the networking in other circles has gone better for now. DC might be calling. I'm hesitant for this transition, and not sure I'd pass their tests to get there. I wasn't sure about interview #1 but I got #2 from it. I wasn't sure about panel interview #1, but got offered a job from it. Now, the time for sitting alone. Now, the time for a tarot reading.

I know it's hippie. I know it's weird. I can't explain it, but I can. Sure, it's mostly the research, the outreach, the work I do to get there. But then there's the secret rituals I do to throw out there my dreams, my needs. I sometimes call it "God" or "Mother" or "Destiny". I meditate. Driving back and forth between Chicago and Madison, Madison and the river. Hours to listen to NPR and catch the college radio stations, fantasize about truck fucks in the road stops, and meditate, think, dream.

I cannot stay much longer with my parents. I love them. I am fascinated by their process and our interactions. I cannot stay. I need my own space. My own kitchen. My own center. I need to pay off the debt. I need the next level in this game. I need to see who I'll become next.

And this all just might take me to DC, into the fray, the speed, the honey bee hive, the lies, the masks, the ambitions, the desires, the steam, the cold, the bones, the waves of change.

After all those prayers of meditation, all this work of humility and drive. I really am not driving the train. As I wasn't when I followed art to Minneapolis, Fernando to Costa Rica, Ryan to Madison, school to Paris. Once I launch the dream of hope, the hunger for experience - someone else starts conducting me there.

I have no idea why or how or wherefore. And, the background checks might prohibit this path. But for now, well, it looks damn near close to the Capitol.

[no editing this one]