Ghosts of Halloweens Past

I was searching for Halloween pictures to bring to work for one of my department's holiday initiatives. Okay, it was sort of my initiative, but nevertheless, it was a good idea and an attempt to lighten the workplace mood a tiny bit. I've since learned that some people hate fun, but naysayers are everywhere. I'm choosing to ignore those people.

The thing some folks don't get about work is that every job isn't soul-quenching. For most of us a job is simply a means to an end ~ the end being a way to pay our monthly bills. We're not uplifted by our daily tasks, nor do we expectantly await never-delivered kudos. Work is essentially drudgery, but we deplete the large measure of our essence at work, so if we want to alleviate some of the slog by having a bit of fun, is that too much to ask?

It wasn't always this way. I used to work in an environment in which Halloween was almost a national holiday. Employees looked forward to the day. It started innocently enough, with a company announcement that folks could dress up. Before long, props got incorporated; and finally actual group performances became the expected norm. A cheap gold-plated trophy was the prize, and we worked damn hard to win it. It is correct to assume that no actual work got done on that particular day ~ in addition to performing for the roaming band of judges, we traversed the office to ogle other units' costumes and affirm our own superiority. Generally, too, there was a pot luck lunch involved, and mass quantities of fun-size candy bars.

I recall driving to work in the dark on Halloween morning hoping to hell I wouldn't get pulled over for some infraction and having to explain why I was dressed as a freak. I remember fluorescent work bathrooms and makeup being artfully applied by a willing accomplice. I remember the local second-hand store's costume basement and rifling through shelves to find just the right costume accessories. It was a quest ~ a holy mission. After all, that peeling-chrome trophy was within our grasp! Halloween was better than Christmas and Thanksgiving and Easter, rolled into one big ball of excitement.

As a naturally shy person, I'd always indulged my creative impulses with solitary pursuits ~ a bit of writing, photography, crafts. I spent my life itching for the next new thing that would allow me to create...anything. It's not that shy people don't crave attention as much as the next-door extrovert; it's just that we're mortified by the thought of being ridiculed. We're convinced we'd die if that ever happened. Creativity expressed behind my own four walls, therefore, was safe; though obviously not celebrated by the world at large.

In my first year of employment at the apple company (no, not "Apple"), a fellow cube-mate who I found loud and obnoxious approached me about doing a group Halloween ensemble. I don't know why I said yes ~ that wasn't like me. I don't even know why she asked me. Maybe everyone else had turned her down. Once committed, though, I wholly dedicated myself to playing my part. And guess what? I liked it.

 (I'm Ace Frehley ~ third from left ~ I had no idea at the time who Ace Frehley was.)

By the following year I was a supervisor; thus I was obliged to join the other supes in their dress-up concept. We were still doing nothing besides showing up in our thrift store wigs and castoffs. 

(I'm the faux blonde on the right.)

By the time 1997 rolled around, I was in charge, at least of my own division. And by then dressing up just wasn't going to cut it. In order to grab that trophy, one had to put on a big show. I canvassed my staff and someone said, "Hee Haw!", so that's what we did. We became hillbillies. We even had our own Minnie Pearl and an old man puffing a corncob pipe. Someone brought in an iron and ironing board. I was missing a tooth and I had a cap that spelled out, "CAP" and one of my shoes read, "left".

(Apparently I also carried a jug of apple cider.)

Things settled down a bit in '98. I don't remember if we were too busy to bother with Halloween much, or had run out of ideas. My staff expected a show, though, and I didn't want to let them down. My treasured friend Laurel and I became Sonny and Cher. We had no performance planned, but daily announcements turned into a Bob Dylan-ish a capella rendition of "I Got You Babe".

My last Halloween at the apple company became the ultimate blowout. I'd never before seen the movie "Grease" (truly), but somehow I found it that year and became enamored. That was it ~ we would turn our little corner of apple world into Rydell High School. Because I had short hair, I would be Danny Zuko. Lovely Laurel was thence Sandy. An employee's daughter had once done a Grease dance routine with her cheer squad, so she came into the office to teach Laurel and me and a phenomenal group of staff members the dance moves. We practiced in my office behind closed doors, accompanied by gales of laughter and quizzical glances from people passing by. We decorated our corner of the building as a county fair, and when the judges made their way into our area, we shocked the hell out of them with a spectacular performance of "We Go Together".

Needless to say, there was no contest that year. We walked away with that tarnished trophy.

Ahh, Halloweens past, when we actually knew how to have fun.

I don't regret my late-in-life awakening to making an utter fool of myself. I'm rather proud of it.

My "Career" ~ Part 6 ~ "Who Do You Think You Are?"

The IKFI unit was an outcast.

We weren't "Claims", after all.  But we shared the same floor as Claims, albeit with our own entrance that no one from the Claims Department deigned to use, because, after all, that would taint them.

There is an inherent snobbery that exists in any office.  A pecking order.  "We're better than....(insert department name here)."

We weren't "smart" like Claims.  We did data entry.  Some of the Claims supervisors even stopped by from time to time to let me know what my division was doing wrong, since they, naturally, were the end users.  I didn't have a problem with that; I did have a problem with the way the feedback was conveyed.  The condescension.

So, even though I had been a top Claims supervisor before my promotion, I was no longer part of the clique.

So, IKFI just went its own way.

We kept growing, and growing rapidly.  We had to take over more office footage, because we were running out of room to seat everyone.  We still had that mix of permanent employees and temps, but by this point, it was understood that a temp position was an audition, really, for permanent placement.  A top performer was guaranteed the opportunity to be hired by the company, and that word had gotten around.

Our first Halloween rolled around, and we, naturally, were delighted to participate in the festivities.

You see, at our office, a tradition had been born back in the first year of our existence.  I don't know exactly how it started, but I do know that I was part of its inception.

We dressed up, as a unit, generally, in some type of theme.  That sounds innocuous enough, but what began as a simple dress-up contest with silly prizes, quickly snowballed into an all-out competition.  Quickly, after that, it was not good enough to simply dress up.  A group had to put on a "skit" of some sort; really wow the crowd...and especially the judges.

Oh, it became cutthroat.  

It started like this:

And progressed to this:

And on and on.

Since the IKFI people were considered morons and imbeciles, we decided to do a "Hee Haw" theme.  It was wonderful.  We had a lady dressed up as Minnie Pearl, with the price tag hanging from her flowered hat.  We had all manner of rubes, especially me; we had a woman in her flannel nightgown and nightcap, ironing at her ironing board.  We even had a cow.

 That's me in my "cap".

My mentor, Carlene, and me (I looked lovely!)

Oh, we were all lovely hayseeds. 

Unfortunately, we were encroaching, it seems, upon a time-honored tradition; and when we won grand prize, well, that just capped it.

It was not our fault that the Claims units were lame.  They were timid.  We were not.  We had no reputation to uphold.  We didn't care.

As time passed, and things started to snowball, I was given the green light to hire additional supervisors.  We split into three units!  And then we hired a second shift!  Two more supervisors!  All total, by the end, we had over 150 people in IKFI.....from three to one hundred and fifty.  In about a year and a half.

The girl who was to become my "main supervisor", Laurel, had started out as an examiner in one of my Claims units.  We found that we shared the same birthday, so that became a natural bond, a starting point for our relationship.  When the opportunity arose to hire another supervisor, Laurel applied, and I took her immediately.  Laurel was one of those people whom you feel like you've known all your life, even if you've only known her for a minute.  She had that special touch. 

Laurel became situated in a glass-walled supervisor cubicle halfway across the room from me.  We could look out and wave to each other, but other communication required direct face-to-face interaction, or a phone call.

By this time, Phil had been "uploaded" to a more responsible position in Fresno, California, proving that it's not what you know; it's who you know.  His replacement was Brenda, who'd been moved upstairs from the Customer Service Department.  Brenda, in essence, shared manager responsibilities with the lovely (to herself) blonde-haired Linda, who was persnickety and decorum-obsessed.  Both Linda and Brenda elevated their secretary, Lisa, to the highest level on the office pedestal.  Lisa was, for all intents and purposes, third in line of ascension to the Acme throne; well above us mere supervisors. 

Some supervisors dealt with that insult by cultivating Lisa's friendship.  Laurel and I, on the other hand, dealt with it by being snarky at every turn.

One day, Brenda sent out a loving email to all the supervisors, informing us that Lisa had been blessed with additional responsibilities.  The email told of how indespensable Lisa was; what a vital wheel of the organization she had proven to be.

TIP:  If you are going to make snarky remarks about an email sent by, ostensibly your boss, be sure to hit "forward", and not "reply".

I don't remember exactly what I said, but it wasn't nice.  My intention was to forward my comments to Laurel, across the way; but I, as you have gathered by now, hit "reply" instead.

You know that moment?  When you realize you just made a giant faux pas?  And it's already been done, and now what the hell are you going to do?  Well, I did that.  One second after I "replied" with my remarks, it hit me that I had screwed up, badly.

Damn.  Here I go again.  Another apology, and I knew I had to give it in person.  Downtrodden, I willed my legs to propel themselves forward, onward to Brenda's office.  I blindly, instinctively, found a chair to plop my ass in, and proceeded to praise Lisa to the heavens.  I mumbled something about how I was "just kidding around", and how I was profusely sorry for my indescretion, and that, trust me, it would never happen again.

Brenda was, to her credit, pretty nice about it.  She kind of waved me off; said, don't worry about it.  She was most likely as uncomfortable, there, in her office, having this conversation, as I was. 

But, as my luck would go, this didn't end there.  Just a few short months later, my number one supervisor, Laurel, committed the exact same sin as I had.  Another glowing email; another snarky comment; another "reply", rather than "forward". 

Laurel was cool about it, though.  She blithely trudged into Brenda's office (I bet Brenda was getting weary of this drill by now), spilled out her requistite apology, and, as icing on the cake, said, "I guess I pulled a 'Shelly'". 

Thanks, pal!  Now I was famous infamous.  Any stupid, assinine mistake would henceforth be referred to as, "pulling a 'Shelly'". 

Even though Laurel blatantly threw me under the bus, I couldn't not stay friends with her.

Plus, I guess, one way to look at it was, we were in this thing together.  We made the same mistakes, we made the same right decisions.  We were a natural team.

And thus, IKFI continued to do things that annoyed the heck out of everyone.

Overtime was a way of life at our company.  If there was ever a stretch when overtime was not mandatory, people began to quake.  They started wondering what was wrong.  Thankfully, for most, those periods only ever happened for a week or two, and then things returned to "normal".  Frankly, the staff had begun to depend on their overtime pay, and they were adrift without it.

On Saturdays, we, like everyone else, had OT.  But we did things a bit differently in our department.  We had a (remote!) manager who gave us a budget to buy prizes, so the supes would go out shopping and buy as many nice things as we could with the dollars we were given.

Then, on Saturday, every half hour or so, we would draw a name out of the hat (literally, a hat), and blow some god-awful sounding horn, and bestow a prize upon some lucky individual, and of course, have our picture taken with the winner; all of us supes wearing our very special hats.........Yes, it was "hat day".

 Tracy on "Hat Day"

I can say without hesitation that we had fun.  And yet, we never shirked our work.  We posted great stats; both quality and production.  I believe it was because our people liked their jobs.

Who else had Elvis show up for my supe, Peg's, birthday?  Nobody, of course.  And, if anyone had even thought of it, would they think to corral an actual employee to play Elvis?  No.  They would have hired one of those impersonators.  And that would have stripped the occasion of all the fun (thanks, Rob!)

 Elvis (Rob) and Peg

And on Peg's next birthday, who would have thought to have President Clinton stop by?  Nobody.  And who would have written a very special speech for the President to deliver to Peg?  Nobody.  (Thanks, Rob, again, for portraying the President!)

 President Clinton (Rob) and Secret Service Agent, Laurel

Shortly after the "hat days", the baton was passed, back there in Philly, to a new manager; a new overseer of the IKFI Department.

A new, young up-and-comer.  Out to prove himself, with our division as the catalyst.

His name was Peter.


To be continued.......... 

My "Career" ~ Part 7 ~ Another New Boss?

My "Career" ~ Part  8 ~ "Everything's Great!"

My "Career" ~ Part 9 ~ A Cold Wind

My "Career" ~ Part 10 ~  Thank You ~ Goodbye

My "Career" ~ Part 11 ~ Breaking the News 

My "Career" ~ Part 12 ~ Loose Ends 

My "Career" ~ Epilogue


Previous Chapters:

My "Career" ~ Part 5 ~ Welcome to the I-Land

My "Career" ~ Part 4 ~ Phil

My "Career" ~ Part 3 ~ Karma

My "Career" ~ Part 2 ~ Evil Bosses

My "Career" ~ Chapter 1

Fa La La La La

I suppose all workplaces have a lot of activities going on this time of year.

For me and mine (?), the big thing this week was the annual departmental decorating contest. The prize is a bowl of candy and someone's old bowling trophy, gussied up to say, "Christmas Decorating Winner" or something to that effect.

It doesn't take much to get those old competitive juices flowing!

Since I am on the Fun Committee (three Michele's/Michelle's and a Jennifer), it was our responsibility to come up with a theme for our department's Christmas decorating. Oh, easy enough, you say. Well, no. First, we had to solicit suggestions, then we had to send out an email so everyone could vote for their favorite, then we had to execute (hmmmm.........execute.......sounds inviting).

So, we had seven suggestions, some of them quite original........and the one that garnered the most votes was.............Individual Cubicles! Yes, we apparently each like to do our own thing.

So, not being very creative in the decorating department, I trudged off to Target to see what I could come up with. I'd already papered my cubicle walls with wrapping paper, courtesy of one of the Michele's, who brought all her leftover paper for everyone to use.

Now, what to add, what to add.........

Well, being on a budget, I didn't want to spend a boatload of money on cubicle decorating, so I found a few things that were "decent yet inexpensive". I got me a string of lights ($2.00), a string of fake cranberries, a card of burgundy bows, and that's about it. (Did I mention I'm not much of a decorator?)

I have to admit, for being such an amateur, my cubicle turned out.......hideous.

But, I had that old Christmas spirit (or I could have used a bit of "spirits"), so I put up all my bows and strung my lights, and plastered a sign on my cubicle that said, (someone else's suggestion), "Christmas BOW-tique".

Whew! I had a theme!

Meanwhile, one of the Michele's had a "Christmas In Arizona" theme, one had a bear theme, Jennifer did her cube up in blue and labeled it, "Blue Christmas". The best one of all was Lori's "Pig Christmas". Lots of pigs and even an ornamental reindeer with a pig nose and tail.

On the other side of the building, my friend Julie's department had gone all out. They had street signs and homemade candy trees and all the other trappings of Christmas.

They deserved to win.

We were the department that begged for pity votes.

I did get to write up the signs for everyone's cubicles, since I do have good handwriting (it's something I'm famous for).

So, at the designated hour, the judges sauntered past. I did a little hand sweep and said, "Christmas BOW-tique", and they said, sarcastically, "Yea, we get it." This did not bode well for our department.

Needless to say, we didn't win the trophy or the bowl of candy. Julie's department won, as it should have.

At least now it's over. Losers again. I guess we just weren't cut out to win someone's old musty bowling trophy.

I guess it's just as well that our plan to "carol" the judges sort of fell apart.

So, Michele T and I went out and smoked and drowned our sorrows with assorted caffeinated beverages.

Next week is Secret Santa. I pray that goes better than the old "Individual Cubes" went over.

Oh, and did I mention that I'm ceding my position on the Fun Committee to someone new in the near future?