If I wanted to be pretentious, I could claim to be one of those infallible working girls (if they exist) with every move carefully planned out.  I could claim that what I do is “act” and not “react”. Wouldn’t that be something?  To be that sort of career person or have the sort of 1+1= 2 career? 

Just recently, I was a part of a conversation in which one woman shared her habit of daydreaming about pitching the perfect presentation at work. In her daydreams, everything goes swimmingly: people laugh when they’re supposed to- they lean forward with huge eyes of interest- they nod appropriately- people who try to trip her up lose- she can answer all queries fluently.

At the end of it all, everyone leaves the room thinking what a singularly brilliant person she is and cannot wait for her to do another presentation. In her real world of work- nothing ever goes that smoothly. There’s always some question designed to make her stumble- fluidity and fluency is struggled for and isn’t so much of a given.

Though I hardly need to say it, say it I will: I’m far from being one of those infallible working girls. (I’m almost quite sure they do not exist). What I have to sustain me are very broad rules- what to do if A or B happens. And most times, these rules/guidelines do prove very useful when A or B does happen.  I also have my optimism.

My optimism is something created by the fact that my life has truly been a case of “when one door slams shut, light shows through another”. Thankfully, I’ve always had options; I’ve always had reason to believe that things are never as bad/desperate as they may seem.

And it is this which makes it easy for me to forgive (I never forget). It is also this which makes me hold out hope that a person who intends on interfering with or ruining my career will understand that there really is no sense in trying and so will leave off. 

 This was why I was sure that another birthday would not see me in a situation like this.  I knew that at this point, there was no real reason for me to continue with any of this. I could walk away from it once and then a thousand times. There were other things I wanted to achieve. The itch was back…I wanted to do more with my life. I wanted my life to account for more than me getting up every morning and finding myself involved in some petty power struggle with working girls and boys who felt their very shadows a threat to them.

Old people have a saying- something about dogs and fleas: play with the dog and you get bitten by its fleas. I think that saying is a warning that you might try as hard as you can to be above something. But, if you’re interacting with those who are very much in that something, then you will find yourself a victim (or worse) of that something. 

It was this saying that came floating into my mind when the editor/CEO/writer/etc of the company stooped to asking me to sharing story ideas with him so that he could have something to write. Again and again, it came to my mind when he thought it sane to suggest I attend and record a session of parliament so that he may use the recordings to pen some story. Each time I declined, I knew, fallible as I was, there were things that I would never ever allow to happen as long as I breathed and lived as a working girl.

NB: Working Girl is updated every Thursday.  So, come back then for #41!