In regard to my Brady Bunch problem, a story illustrative of my mother’s humor and cruelty:

As an adult, I was visiting Pat and was in a separate room from her, no doubt toiling at some task she had waiting for me. From the living room she excitedly called, “Denise, there’s a Brady Bunch reunion special or something on…”

I came into the room to join her, and as I crossed the threshold, ZAP, the television was turned off via her remote.

Gleefully, Pat informed me she had been waiting to do that for decades. She hated that show, hated that I needed to always watch it and had harbored a 20+ year, anti-Brady grudge unquenched until that moment.

She killed herself laughing at me, while refusing to turn the TV back on.

In regard to job searching:

A couple of things have come up and a couple of interviews will be happening this week. I face them with mixed fucking feelings. If only I had been born dripping with gold and silver rather than cotton and tinfoil.

In regard to job fields:

A logical place to get a job might be biotech, which would be hip to some of my administrative skills but have the cash on hand that non-profits do not. However, I inwardly clench every time I consider working with scientists again.

One story that keeps sticking in my mind is the day the Division Chief happily told me that my name had come up in a lunchtime conversation. Apparently the institute’s power elite were bemoaning their lack of interested, interesting administrative support and found themselves evaluating whether there were any “intellectuals” among the administrative staff.

I was lauded, it seems, and had gained a reputation for what exactly I don’t know. Perhaps my mad reading comprehension skills and all that book learning?

I think the story was meant to flatter me, not piss me the fuck off at the audacious arrogance of the scientists I “served.”

In regard to feminism in this post-modern age:

Somebody out there might ask does Dee-Rob do laundry for menfolk?

The answer is “yes.”

However, she spends the fluff and fold time rationalizing the importance of partnership in a mutually giving and caring relationship and tells herself she is participating in that development. She also tells herself that actual employment will likely hault the laundry train, while M. and she then add to the local economy by hiring an immigrant to make their whites whiter.

Oh, and it’s a good day when you check the mail and there’s something from both of your favorite young men in Massachusetts.