Monday Mornings - Story #6

Monday 9:00 a.m. April 17

My morning had just started but my night had just ended. I shouldn't have stayed out all night. I'm on less than four hours sleep and I found myself trapped in a small room decorated by projection screens and whiteboards. The room reeked of the smell of six figure salaries and cheating husbands. I was surrounded by grown men wearing suits that inexcusably needed the hand of a good tailor. These are my would be mentors. After discussing “handicaps” and the other night's survivor episode we all made our way to our designated places.

I presented my work first. I had mastered the art of Spread Sheets. I can make anything look professional if you gave me an hour on Microsoft Excel. It's probably why I still work here. Half an hour into my presentation and I drastically required another shot of expresso or at least a cup of coffee to keep me going. I'm half awake and as the meeting progresses its becoming more and more apparent to everyone in the room that outside of my spreadsheets I am in fact, unprepared. I need an excuse. During the break, I commented to a co-worker that I was feeling under the weather and it was the reason why I looked the way I did. I had bags underneath my eyes, my face was colorless, my hair uncombed and my white Ralph Lauren shirt was completely wrinkled. I think she bought it and word started to spread. My active nightlife has been masked by my poor excuses and fine spreadsheet work. Disaster avoided.

A couple of hours later and the meeting was on its final leg. My boss, who constantly dumped all his work on me and significantly made more money was now on the podium. He stood in front of the projection screen wearing his typical Monday black and white stripped tie. He had a tie for every day of the work week. He also had an ulcer and a fat wife. I was now on my third cup of coffee and he began reciting my first year economics' text book. The higher you climb up the corporate ladder, the more what you studied in university starts to directly apply to your job. Your job starts to become a career and your career starts to become your life. Sooner or later your priorities shift and you find yourself in Starbucks on a first name basis with a cashier who you secretly yearn for, ordering coffee imported from a country you've never even visited. You start to spend your nights raising children you can't relate to and not having sex with a woman you vowed to love through sickness and health. You spend weekends playing a game you can't stand (golf) just to get away from a life you regret. You spend the majority of your time in front of a computer emailing co-workers about the "latest quarterly figures" while snacking on a snack that contains "0 trans fat" just to feel a false sense of control. Welcome to the next 40 years of my life.

This week's meeting was specifically dedicated to the advancement of the company. We had grown twenty-five percent each year for the last three years. The numbers were phenomenal and it was the obvious reason why the firm had been voted best in Canada for the last three years. Several Power Point presentations with pictures and elaborate graphs were made. Colorful, extravagant, bounded and laminated reports were handed out. Future financial compensations were promised. Everyone looked happy. People even clapped. But honestly that profit will be spent on another brand new Beemer or an expensive piece of jewelry for the firm's Chief Executive's wife as a form of severance for his “slip up” with his administrative assistant during last year's company Christmas party. None of us are getting that raise. Whether the company makes or loses a million it doesn't affect me. It doesn't really affect any of us. So who really cares. Definitely not me. I was more concerned about the prospect of calling the hot wannabe model's number I had saved on my phone and sacrificed my sleep for just half a day ago.

Any half decent looking girl dressed bohemian chic in this city is all of a sudden a model. Volunteering at a local school's fashion event, entering the Chin picnic, having you're club “photographer” friend take photos of you in pseudo care free poses and a coke habit does not make you a model. You are not Kate Moss. Getting your big break as the daily sunshine girl does not make your career. Giving a blow job to that club promoter wearing that Ed Hardy t-shirt one size too small promising he will get you in touch with the right people was a waste of your time. Keep going down this path and you will serve drinks and possibly wings to inebriated men acting like teenage high school jocks for the rest of your life. That tall, awkward looking, unconventionally beautiful girl with the A cup breast size, she's the model. You are just the aging bartender that wasted your tips on a bad breast job. Go back to school and leave the modeling to actual models. But truth be told, the city needs these girls. Men need these type of women. I need these women. They have the biggest attitude and pretend to have absolute confidence but they really don't. Most of them have nothing else going for them but their unoriginal, conventional t.n.a. type of beauty. They are a dime a dozen and deep down they know this. That is why they have no booking agent, constantly have to hustle their “portfolios” and fish for approval with every chance they get. High school ended a long time ago and so did their power over me. Secretly, they desperately desire my attention. They need it and why shouldn't I give it to them? Why not sacrifice my sleep, enjoy the company and excitement of these fake breasted insecure women. They might not give me a relationship with substance but I'm not looking to marry someone to cheat on any time soon. I still own more than five pairs of ties. I have nothing better to do with my nights. And hell, it's definitely better than sitting around watching Survivor.