I was born without the “nurturing” gene. If you need a comforting hug, a sympathetic smile or an avuncular pep talk, you’d best look elsewhere. Quite honestly, unless you have four legs and a tail, I’m the last one you would want to look to for comfort. In fact, when confronted with an emotional crisis of any magnitude, my initial tendency is to either a) pretend I don’t notice or b) tell myself “they’re only doing it for attention” and then pretend not to notice. This has always served me quite well.
So when I returned to work after lunch on a rainy winter day and saw our office manager with her head in the freezer I pretended not to notice. When she left the freezer and walked by my desk red faced and puffy-eyed I also pretended not to notice and I was still pretending when I heard indiscriminate sniffling from her office. Our office manager is of the personality type commonly referred to as a Drama Queen. She has an incredibly complex home life and fractious relationships with her husband, mother, siblings and children: there was no telling what may have set her off today.
But then she was next to my desk; with her feet planted and her lips quivering, she announced, “I think I’m having a hot flash.” Our office manager is in her mid-40’s and this seemed entirely plausible to me, but not knowing what to say, I said nothing, staring at her stupidly.
“I’m too young to have hot flashes,” she said. “What should I do?”
In a fit of inspiration I said, “Go talk to the Directors; they’ll know.” The “Directors” are the two women who share the next office. They are the Directors of Operations and Customer Service, respectively, and they are both in their early 60’s, sweet, maternal and wise. They both have children and grandchildren, elderly parents and cats. They are the first to bake cakes or attend wakes and would be, I assumed, the perfect resource for a middle-aged woman having a meltdown over her first hot flash.
There is not even the pretense of privacy in our office so I heard our Office Manager go into the Directors’ office and announce, “I think I’m having a hot flash. What should I do?”
Without missing a beat the Operations Director said, “Get used to it” while the Customer Service Director said, “They’ll be plenty more.” My jaw hit my desk. “But I’m too young to have a hot flash,” said the Office Manager, much less forcefully now.
“What are you,” said Operations, “48?” “I’m 42,” said the Office Manager, stung.
“I was way younger than you are when I had my first,” said Customer Service, adding thoughtfully, “I’ve been having them for 22 years now,” while Operations nodded vigorously. The Office Manager rushed right back to the freezer.
I couldn’t resist: I walked into the Directors’ office. “Smooth,” I said, “really smooth.”
Two sets of bi-focaled eyes regarded me coldly. “Really,” said Operations, “if she wants comfort tell her to get a cat,” while Customer Service said, “Who am I, her mother?”
“She doesn’t talk to her mother,” I pointed out. “Now I see why,” said Operations.
“Now what?” I asked.
“Turn down the AC,” said one while the other advised, “Buy a bigger freezer.”
In the end we’ve all adapted. Even in July I now wear a sweatshirt to work since our office is maintained at a near-Arctic temperature, and it sounds a trifle odd when I tell someone on the phone, “Let me get the manager, she’s in the freezer.” And I realize that I am not the only one in the office who is missing the nurturing gene.