Wasn't under it, now I'm over it ...

Jabber - to talk or utter rapidly, indistinctly, incoherently, or nonsensically; chatter. rapid, indistinct, or nonsensical talk; gibberish.

Greetings WAISWTW followers. How I have missed you, sorry for my brief absence, trouble was a brewin’ on the career front.

The weeks at work have been ripe with rumors buzzing so thick you have to swat them away constantly. Unfortunately, they are menacing and causing panic and confusion at every step as if a monster was lurking at every turn. (hence my Jabber(get it?)wocky!)

The rumors in the workplace are that we are low on funding and everyone’s job is in peril. Each day there is fresh news to add to the dread. Granted, our head honcho gave an informative speech to the masses recently reassuring them that we were for sure going to have to cut about 20 percent of our workforce, but somehow manage this without anyone being forced out of their job.

WHAT!?!?! Not completely sure how that works, but it sounded very convincing. Pretty sure that if 150 people have to go, there are going to be a few in that many who didn’t volunteer to leave. (but that’s just me … )

The following week has birthed new information that slaps that language square in the jaw. But it leads everyone to question if it is official or if it is just the paranoid ranting of the office busybodies, doing their best to create a disturbance in the force.

Now the amount of whisperings is skyrocketing while trying to cover up the mass hysteria lingering just under the surface.

No matter how many of these websites and self-help advice tips I find, I know that they only work if everyone participates, otherwise no one will ever be truly free of this gossip disease. But I do always enjoy reading these and believing in a Utopian work society. Hey, a girl can dream right?

And yes, by telling this I am helping to continue the "talk", but I just thought an explaination for my absence was needed.

Whilst my job is laid on the chopping block in the turbulence of lack of funding, I shall try to think of other times when office rumors left my head spinning.

A few years ago I made friends with a girl in my office. She was a few years younger than me, yet was much more - shall we say – experienced in life. This girl had partied hard until hard was pummeled into dust. She had bedded more lovers than I would like to recount (because, oh yes, she did like to share those details … bleh). She drank, she skanked, she lived it up in ways that made me fear I would get an STD vicariously through her stories.

Now, while we were friends, I did not judge, I supported her in what she wanted to do with her life as long as it made her happy. I can’t say I had the wherewithal to live such a live-style, but I didn’t want to seem prudish and judgmental. But looking back on it now, knowing what I know of how our friendship ended and the horrible decisions she made, I can say I doubt those will be stories she would ever want her future children to know or repeat.

During our time as friends, new ladies came to work with us in our office. They were nice women in their 30s and 40s, who were desperately trying to know what the younger crowd was in to. Regrettably, their thirst for this knowledge also brought with it their imaginations and creative fictions.

I didn’t talk with them about my personal life because I was their team leader and wanted to remain professional. This only gave them the fuel they needed to start a brushfire. I learned within the next few days that they had hypothesized that because I am a blonde that it must be true that I “have more fun”.

I learned that they were saying that I must spend most of my time out of work partying harder than the Delta Tau Chi Fraternity and probably entertaining the male persuasion like Mata Hari. Let me be clear, I am just not that much fun.

My friend, who actually could have spoken to this lifestyle, heard these rumors at the time and tried eagerly to convince them that while I was a good friend, I was pretty much a stick in the mud. I both appreciated that, and felt a pang of depression knowing that I was in fact, kinda boring, but still satisfied with what I was.

Later on, when my friend and I stopped being friends, she became acquaintances with these ladies. They quickly learned of her extracurricular activities, but chose to applaud them and her. Though they knew this about her, they decided to put the reputation that would go with these life choices onto me instead.

I would hear my exfriend tell of her nightly escapades in the office then by the next week hear the same story retold somewhere else in the building, but this time with my name substituted for hers.

As I said in my introductory blog, my alter ego is having much, much, much more fun than I ever will.

What is told in the ear of a man is often heard 100 miles away. ~Chinese Proverb

Here is something a little harder than my normal music videos, for those who can appreciate it.