‘A leader is a dealer in hope’ — NB
The day after her fortieth birthday, my mother removed the expensive ring my father had given her the night before (to much public applause at his favorite fancy restaurant.)
Mom got down on her hands and knees to drain the dirty water from the malfunctioning washing machine so she could wash Dad’s boxers. She planned to pack them in his suitcase as he left on yet another business trip.
From her position on the floor, my mum explained that being a happy woman required a lady to “accept what they give you, not expect what you asked for.”
She’d wanted a new washing machine for her fortieth.
Dad knew.
At the time, I probably rolled my eyes and muttered something about how ‘you just don’t ask for things effectively, Mom! God, you’re such a [the term ‘Karen’ did not yet exist, but that’s pretty much what I would have inserted here.]’
I was a teenage sh!t.
My mother was not a ‘happy woman.’
But, at the time, I figured it was her choice. She was like Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh, just a generally depressed…donkey…constantly nagging the rest of us.
In my youth, if gender was fluid, I mostly identified as a future (white) male. I was going to go places and move things and get paid for my services. I was not going to work for free for people who plied me with pretty trinkets but offered me no capital or equity.
I was going to take full advantage of my remunerative options.
I was not going to clean toilets or do laundry.
Thus, I was not going to take after my mother. The woman had only purchased a passport in her thirties, for chrissakes.
And said passport remained in her top dresser drawer, unused, for another decade, before she came to visit me.
While visiting, she did wash my laundry and clean my toilet.
What? It was my maid’s week off.
Mom offered! Out of love!
Today, as I review my CV and examine positions held, I see that I work more with computers than domestic machinery. Yet most of my former positions make me out to be a common law work wife to a superior male.
And I didn’t even get any jewelry. At least, none that I didn’t buy for myself.
Back to our modern-day progress.
Now women and minorities can officially be managers (though not too many of them — a minority of minorities is preferable, for some reason. I blame the French.)
Plus, whatever your identity, as a ‘new age’ manager, you can take your own work wives. Work wives are diverse — you can take same-sex, trans, undefined — you can even take more than one work wife!
At work, managers are encouraged to be creative, to explore more complicated, even taboo family structures.
For example, the head of the work-family, whether they identify as male or female or nonbinary, is, in the name of efficiency, permitted a level of polygamy that even the Mormons envy.
Managers can take on several secretaries, assistant project managers, administrative assistants, associates, contractors, contracting agencies (which function as a sort of outsourced work harem), and interns (under-age is okay, within reason. Also, in this day and age, it’s important to pay the intern something.)
Progress.
Work-family patriarchs can be ladies. They are allowed to borrow from other work families for specific workflows, and they can create and eliminate positions, like the head of a mafia clan, but with less blood.
One of my last bosses, for example, was male, though proudly effeminate. He bought me a coffee every other morning and groomed my ego in his annual reviews of my productivity.
He was a well-trained manager — he provided constructive criticism sandwiched between vague positive aphorisms.
That said, he was not at all convinced that I was not replaceable, or that I was in a good position to evaluate my work or anyone else’s (especially his.)
Despite our many years together, this manager was not convinced that my work was worth anywhere near what his work was worth. To be fair, in this, he was not inconsistent with any other manager that I’ve ever had.
He was thus not particularly interested in revising our structural system, which adhered remarkably to the traditional corporate cadre (and nuclear family) of the 1950s:
- He was the madman at the center.
- I and my other all-female subordinate grade colleagues were expected to clean his dirty laundry, so to speak.
- We made his presentations sparkle.
- We planned and daily managed his projects no matter how ephemeral.
- We smiled grimly but silently as he accrued credit and influence on the backs of our necessary but somehow hidden, lesser-value contributions.
- We were the minions of his Mastermind, the singing rodents industriously preserving and fostering his legacy as he ascended the political ladder.
If we were good little vassals, prestige and promotions would trickle down.
To some of us.
Maybe.
Eventually.
Our employment benefits were great though. Full healthcare coverage, paid holidays, and the occasional work trip abroad.
I mean, my own mother would have been horrified if I left that well-paid, somewhat pointless position of service to seek meaning and fulfillment.
Mom raised children and provided what during COVID would have been termed ‘essential services’ (she knows CPR.) All her ‘essential knowledge’ and meaning meant nothing for her bank account or for her pension (she never had one.) However, it was critical to our family's maintenance.
Mom could have pawned the jewelry my father procured for her for a little extra personal cash, but that would have made Dad feel bad.
Dad didn’t get why Mom constantly complained about wanting her own money, time, and external validation. He didn’t see how Mum could achieve a role with more intrinsic value than the supportive, all-consuming wifely motherhood position with which he had kindly graced her.
The salary notwithstanding.
Dad made enough for us all anyway, right? It’s not like Mom was struggling.
Dad concretely demonstrated his approval of Mom’s career choice and general performance. He provided rationally spaced gifts of expensive vacations and a bonus necklace, watch, or ring every December.
Sometimes he even took her out for coffee.
‘A man is never so tall as when he stoops to serve a child,’ Dad said when ‘babysitting’ his kids so his wife could clean toilets without interruption.
It’d be cliche to say Dad usually put us in front of the TV when he was ‘in charge.’
Cliche.
But accurate.
I remember meeting my former boss’s life partner for the first time.
It was early in our work relationship — a harried mid-week afternoon.
My boss was rushing to catch a train for a high-level meeting in another country, and he’d forgotten his overnight bag.
I was on the phone in his private office, confirming his train tickets (first-class so he could prepare i.e. read over the slides my colleague and I created for him last week.)
I remember wishing I could sneak a shot of something in honor of us workwives everywhere.
Then my boss’s partner showed up. The partner was red-faced and sweaty, with paint stains all over his shirt. In his hands, he clutched my boss’s forgotten overnight bag.
‘So sorry I’m late, sweetie!’ the partner explained. ‘I had to duck out of work early and I couldn’t find the substitute. I can’t just leave my class unsupervised — they’re only children.’
My boss came charging out of his private toilet, obviously in a hurry. He grabbed his valise from his partner. ‘That my bag? Thanks. Did you talk to your boss about the extra vacation yet?’
My boss’s partner had glanced at me and visibly blushed. ‘Not yet…it’s been a rough couple of years at the school and I don’t want to push…’
My boss assumed his favorite power stance, arms akimbo. ‘Honey, you need to learn to assert yourself! I can’t always do it for you.’
I left them to their little domestic altercation to finish up a few talking points for my manager’s next conference. It was probably some sort of conference on upskilling staff if I remember well.
At the time, my boss was always trying to encourage his higher-ups to adopt more emotionally intuitive management styles. He advocated ‘leadership as a service,’ like in the Scouts. He said this correlated with increased productivity and decreased costs.
That boss’s preferred tagline went something like, ‘Good leadership empowers others to succeed.’
That reminds me….
I should leave my maid a kindly worded thank you note for the sparkling floors last week. She went above and beyond what I paid her for.
Maybe I’ll also leave her a packet of gourmet coffee.
As a bonus.
It’s too soon in our relationship for jewelry.
