Adult in Training

Dear Dickies,

I recently purchased one of your jackets-disguised-as-a-flannel-shirt.  I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised by how warm it is!  I bought it because my regular winter jacket was continually getting quite dirty while I was at work, so I decided I needed a cheap jacket I wouldn’t mind ruining.  For a mere $20, I feel I have already gotten more than my money’s worth in the last week.

I will say this though: have you perhaps considered branching out into women’s wear?  I say this only because, while I am impressed with the quality of your product, I would enjoy it even more if I didn’t look like a butch lesbian whenever I wore it.  The jacket is a men’s medium (I couldn’t find a small anywhere) and I fairly swim in it.  A more flattering cut would go a long way. 

Also, I bought a pair of your work pants earlier in the year, since Dickies and work wear are practically synonymous.  I love all the pockets, hate the cut of the pants.  For someone with hips, they are not very flattering.  Despite the fact that I bought pants with a 34″ waist (which I know for a fact should hang dangerously low on my hips) I always seem to look like a muffin-top in these pants.  Unless I pull them up high enough to qualify for Mom Jeans.  Neither look is one that I am particularly fond of.

I’m not sure how many women you employ, given that your product is geared exclusively to men, but I’m sure that if you asked any woman, regardless of where they worked, they would tell you that no woman wants to feel like a butch lesbian with a muffin-top or Mom Jeans.  And I have to tell you, I don’t think I am the only woman in a male-dominated work field who would appreciate it if you came out with a women’s line.  I realize that your brand name doesn’t necessarily lend itself easily to women’s wear, but honestly I don’t think it matters.

Sincerely,

A Pleasantly Surprised Customer

Every girl dreads hearing those words, because every girl knows it’s just code for: “You look like crap.” Last night at work, I’m fairly certain that every single guy I work with told me one or the other.  I must have looked a hot mess.  Which isn’t really surprising, since I felt a hot mess.  It’s still discouraging though, to know I did such a poor job concealing it.

When I got to work I was feeling a little tired and my knee felt like I had twinged it somehow.  By the time first break rolled around, I felt like I was going to throw-up and I was walking with a pronounced limp.  This is when the comments started to roll in.  “Are you okay, you look… tired.”  What I probably looked was green.  However, when I brushed it off with: “Just a little nauseous, which seems to be the norm lately.” The memory of the Lead Fist was still fresh in my mind.  However, the first comment out of one of the guys was: “Are you pregnant?”  I’d like to say I sent him a withering glare, but at that point I was holding my head in my hands, and couldn’t really be bothered to.  I did however scoff, and ask him to please not spread that rumour, as my reputation – while spotless outside of work – has already taken enough abuse.

After break I went back to work.  At one point, I needed a pump truck to pull a skid in from outside.  So I asked one of my friends, who happens to be a grandpa.  As I limped my way over there, he gave me a speculative look.  “What’s wrong?”  I told him nothing, my knees just hurt sometimes.   Instead of believing me, he decided the reason I looked like crap was because I had been ridden hard the day before.  I thought the best course of action would be to change the subject.  I was wrong, because my friend took this evasion as proof positive he was on the right track.  After that, all night, whenever he saw me limping around, he would sort of smile and shake his head.

I told my mom via instant message when I got home, and she told me to go to the doctor.  I just switched doctors, and frankly I was hoping I could break her in with something routine.  My old doctor was absolutely useless.  When I came home with a list of maladies after my sophomore year of college, she limited me to just two complaints, and reponded to both with: “Sometimes that sort of thing just happens.”  Really?  Couldn’t you like order some tests, or something, just to fool me into thinking you know what you’re doing?  I’m going to go to this new doctor with: I’m twenty-three and I think I have arthritis.  Oh, and the other day I discovered this weird lump behind my ear.  Fix me.”  And all I have to say is this: If she says that these things sometimes happen, I may shank her with the ear examiner.

Okay, so I know it’s been awhile, and I know that at this point people have probably stopped checking my blog, unless it’s by accident.  I was in a bit of a funk.  To say the least.  And while I am not exactly in the fast-lane of life, I am back on the highway at least, and travelling in the right direction.  And while I have dithered over starting up again for some time, I have finally put on my proverbial pants (since no one would really want to know my pants-status, that’s an over-share, even for me) and start writing again.

Another reason is that I really miss it.  I have been writing papers in one form or another for… what, like nine years?  So I always had a place to channel it.  And so I never really stopped to think about what it would be like to not be writing.  Even when one of my profs asked me why I write, I gave him some cheesy answer, probably about getting to know myself better.  But I think the real answer might be because when I’m not writing, I feel like something is missing.  Something important. 

So, it’s 9:50 and I am trying to entertain myself for the next hour so I don’t fall asleep before I have to take my car into the mechanic’s to have my winter tires put on.  That’s right, it is the return of the Winter Tire.  Please see almost any of my previous posts to understand exactly why my next car is going to have all-wheel drive.  And why this year Dad got me snow tires for Christmas!  Good work Dad.  Because while some girls would ask for a pony, or their two front teeth, all I want is to leave the house feeling secure in the fact that even though it may be snowing, I will be able to return in a timely manner without having to leave my vehicle, or bat my eyelashes to attract someone to do it for me.  Particularly since I am not very good at batting my eyelashes.  So now I have four snow tires, and frankly the new pair look like they could easily power a tank.  I think I am in good hands.  Now if I get stuck, I can’t blame my mechanic, or that stupid man at Canadian Tire, who told me to put the snow tires on the rear wheels, even though I have front-wheel drive. 

The last time I went to the mechanic, I dropped like $500.  And no, it wasn’t to replace the bumper that got dinged by the iceberg masquerading as a cushy snowbank.  It was for a variety of things, including a new battery, so that my car will start without kind words and crossed fingers.  And some other things.  And I found out that the weird “clacking” sound it was making was just the clutch plate (as if I know what that is) and not something I have to worry about.  Until my clutch goes.  Hopefully after I get a new car, so it’s no longer my problem.

And then I am coming home for a nap.  Part of living in the slow-lane of life includes working the overnight shift at Wal-Mart doing renovations.  Which is why I’m not at work right now.  But, why I am really tired.  So home for a nap, and then to pick my mom up from the airport.  Because she selfishly went on a work conference to Boulder, Colorado.  She texted me that it’s snowing there right now.  I am so many levels of jealous right now, it’s not even funny.  But I will pick her up nonetheless.  Because nothing sucks more than arriving at the airport, and finding that there is no one there to pick you up. Second on the Airport Sucking List is the time that my boyfriend at the time came to pick me up from the airport after Christmas break, with his friend, who was my friend’s boyfriend.  And they didn’t want to park, so they just kept driving around the small-ass airport loop, and we didn’t have cell phones to call them and tell them we couldn’t find our luggage, and they couldn’t get out of the car, so it resulted in low-speed charades while sitting (on their part).  Harder both to act out and to interpret than it sounds.