Hello High Heelers
Well slap me silly and call me Gertrude. Today started off in a really bad way. Firstly, I was running late because I forgot to set my alarm clock yesterday and woke up way past ‘awake time,’ and on the wrong side of the bed. Then my security guard called me to add to my admin time – while I was trying very hard to catch up on my lateness. And to top it all off (which is probably why I was ready to stay in my pyjamas and play Bridget Jones this morning) it’s the sixth anniversary of my best friend’s tragic passing away. Not good.
The 12th of March always looms like a dark cloud of guilt, sadness, dulled hope and intense ‘missing’ – firstly missing her and secondly being sad that she’s missed out on so much. I try to avoid it every year. I try to ignore it, or sleep through it. And every year it catches me and shakes me up violently making me lose my breath, leaving me gasping for air. This morning I sat in the traffic feeling very raw – like all of my guts had been ripped out. I was crying buckets and wiping up my tears while trying to not smudge mascara all over my face – or look like a psychotic lunatic.
Whenever I see women sitting in their cars and sobbing in the rush hour traffic jams I make up stories for them. Like one distraught teenager last Wednesday. I decided that she had just been dumped by her ‘squeaky clean’ med-student boyfriend, called Patrick. He had suddenly realised that he was destined to become a tightrope walker so he ran off with circus people to find his sense of balance. She looked so miserable and unfocussed that I was quite worried that she was going to crash into me. In all reality, she had probably just had a fight with her mother. But the boyfriend story is more interesting – right?
Somehow I arrived at the office today looking rather unlike a raccoon (thanks waterproof Maybelline) – and without having had a boyfriend leave me to join the circus (thank goodness). But I did start off by growling at my young minion and I then found myself explaining to him that I’m in a foul mood and am not to be taken seriously all day. He took the explanation well and put up with my grumbling all morning – until I finally got over myself later in the day and allowed myself to smile a little and even laugh.
Sometimes your private life will affect you on a work level. We all know that it’s not ideal. We know that our life issues should be left at the threshold of the office doors. We know that the Marketing Department is no space for personal issues. But some of those issues are just so very heavy that as much as we try to shake them off as we walk into our corporate selves, they stay with us like heavy burdens that affect everything we do. It happens. It just does. So we need to deal with it.
The unfair part is that the more burdens we’re weighted down with, the harder it is to climb. So let’s remember that we’re allowed to have difficult days from time to time, but we simply cannot allow them to hold us back when we’re heading up. I’m annoyed that I let today get to me. But I’m glad that my friend was so special, that I will never forget her, and that on the 12th of March I will continue to feel a sense of intense ‘missing’ because there is an empty void in my heart that cannot be filled by anyone else. It’s ok. But it’s one of the few things, on one of the rare days, that I will allow myself to be overwhelmed with life ‘stuff’.
Let’s shake off the silly issues this week. Then, let’s take the big burdens off our backs and figure out how we’re going to lighten them and carry them in such a way that they do not hold us back but rather direct us up. Let’s stand tall, be real and get on with living. Have a great week.
Cheers,
Jo
(This post is dedicated to my special friend Robynne. She was and will always be the best friend a High Heeler could have had. I miss you every day Robs.)
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