Well ladies and gentlemen, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.
When your life inside the fabric covered box which resides within an office building encounters a quarterly desktop dusting event where the custodial staff dedicated additional resources to make sure that your cubicle and those around you are free of clutter and particulate (airborne or otherwise), you should take advantage of the process by clearing off the picture frames, office supplies, and other desktop littler from your work space the night before and boldly displaying your ‘Please dust my cubicle’ sign.
For all tents and porpoises, you should probably understand that I have a lot of pithy slogans which summarize how to live life here in the 21st century, and most of them are pretty darned wordy and loaded up with intentional malapropisms.
Spoonerisms are coming soon.
As we embark upon the March of 8th on pins and needles with baited breath in full anticipation of the annual celebration of International Women’s Day, I’d like to set this time aside to call attention to a few things in the process.
For what it’s worth, a celebration is scheduled at the office I occupy on occasion. Posters are plastered all over the place featuring beautiful young women adorned in patterned tank tops and yoga pants which reveal all sorts of secrets not meant to be revealed. Other posters feature a face of an AOC type of look, sans the Margaret Keane buggy eyes.
None of the individuals in these posters are non-diverse.
None of them are older than thirty.
None of them are aesthetically challenging.
None of them look like any sort of beacon of light in their field whose achievements could be held up as the next in a long series of milestones to achieve; unless of course that milestone involves modeling a patterned top and yoga pants for some vapid print advertisement for International Women’s Day.
One of the conference rooms has been reserved to host the festivities as the subjugated masses endeavor to subjugate themselves further with the mentality that they’ve been put upon because of their gender. Sure that used to be the way things were done, but is it really still done that way today?
Activities are planned which will teach us all about the gender’s achievements of the past. Developmental resources will be available for the taking. Jewelry will be donated to those in need of accessories as they endeavor to get through job interviews on assets beyond just their qualifications.
Don’t forget the selfie station.
I shit thee not.
As much as I could just sit here and rail against the premise and how it’s being mishandled in my own (and potentially yours too) little corner of the universe, I’m not going to do that. You don’t need me to take to the internet to explain that it’s not the circumstances of what gender or color we are that define our abilities to shine. For me to even try to discuss that would be misconstrued all Oxford comma style as mean spirited, hateful, and misogynistic.
As such, I will avoid the temptation of dedicating a quantity and quality of web space to discussing the well intentioned yet misguided intentions around tomorrow’s celebrations.
I was going to offer up a soliloquy about my favorite princess who once exploited a clever distraction created by her twin brother so that she could strangle the ever-lovin’ shit out of a one and a half ton slug; all the while ensconced in a golden bikini. Granted, she kissed her brother a few times, but that was before she knew they were siblings. Even then, it was nowhere near the intensity those Lannister twins exhibited while locking their lips.
She spent her whole life standing up to the bad guys, leading rebellions, and lending her talents to serving the greater good. At the same time, I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t have wasted her time occupying the selfie station at an International Women’s Day celebration.
And so with that my beloved reader, I’ll offer up the following advice.
As you traipse through whatever celebration of one gender over another on International Women’s Day, be sure to take in all of the festivities the day has to offer. Give your jewelry and get your jewelry. Make new friends. Build new relationships. Take some selfies and be sure to add an octotroph or two to those pictures when you upload them to social networking.
Once you’ve acquired access to more developmental resources tailored to your gender and your gender alone, you’ll need to do one more thing in order to cap off the day’s celebrations.
That one thing of course, is to clean off your desk in preparation for the quarterly desktop dusting event, which just happens to coincide with International Women’s Day.
Git-R-DoneY’all.
