Legs

It's day two of me being the boss lady again. Michael is on holidays. I had no one to grumble to today when the client was biting back and the designer was telling me I wasn't trying hard enough. Normally I just cope by sucking it up and swallowing the criticism. You can't take anything personally in this field of work; you do and you will die a slow, spirit-crushing death. Put all your heart into your work and then hand the product over to the people with the money that talks. Believe it or not, it will make you better and then one day you will be the one with the money and power. I'm developing a thick skin to handle the disapproving feedback, but today I was struggling.

I'm working on a testimonials project these days. Let me see if I can explain this without compromising the strict "do not talk about the company" policy. Good-Wooden Leg (an alias Vince came up with for me) is a manufacturer of "wooden legs". Sometimes things happen to people and they lose their legs. Good-Wooden helps its clients in their times of need by giving them new legs to stand on. So for this project I interviewed people who got legs from Good-Wooden when they needed them most.

At first I hated the assignment. I get really anxious whenever I have to do an interview. I'm always afraid I won't get enough material out of my subject to write a good piece, and then once the interview is over, the opportunity to get the right quotes is over too. That being said, I can't really remember anyone ever being less than impressed with a story of mine, some how I always manage to make it work.

Talking to these clients has been a wonderful experience. They all have amazing stories, the kind that make you go, "I had a bad day today, but that's nothing compared to the stress they went through". I also talked to someone who wasn't a client of Good-Wooden when he lost his legs to stand on. On top of that, he advised his wife to become a client of Good-Wooden, based on his own experience and regret, but she didn't listen and then she lost her legs too. It was a heartbreaking story on paper, but this guy had an amazing, optimistic attitude about life. If he can still see the bright side, surely I can get through a rough day at the office or a ho-hum Saturday night.

I always hand my articles over with reluctance to Michael. I am terrified inside of my work not being good enough, but I'm getting better at shrinking that fear. Like most fears, it's irrational (Michael thinks my work is good and usually only has minor changes to clean up the piece) but based on bad past experiences. These articles have turned out to be some of my proudest examples of what I can do. Telling someone's story, whether it is mine, someone else's, or a character I've created, is one of the things I do best. It's the commas that I struggle with.

It was raining outside this afternoon when I looked out my cubicle window. I could see the neon red cross on the top of the Misercordia Hospital, standing out against the dark sky. The darker the sky the brighter it shines. I'm sure this is a typical Christian metaphor that has been described before.

My sister phoned me. She was upset. It's her 25th birthday tomorrow but it's not turning out to be the party she'd like. As she told me about her woes all my own stress and worries floated away and I found myself wishing I could fix everything for her. I wouldn't want what she's dealing with right now.

She called me again later and things were looking up. "I felt better after I talked to you," she told me. I felt better too.

She's got legs, she knows how to use them
She never begs, she knows how to choose them

--Legs, ZZ Top