Tuesday, June 13, 2006

Go To The Nurse Day!

You have a three-hour status meeting today, which means three hours of sitting across the conference room table from Nora Dominick, trying to hide your heartbreak behind a look of concern for next quarter's projected revenue.

Your job has a few perks, one of the most valuable of them being an on-site Nurse's Office that employees can visit when they have stomach aches. When the meeting becomes too much for you to bear, simply whisper to your supervisor that your stomach hurts and ask her for permission to go to the Nurse's office.

At the Nurse's Office, the Nurse will lay you down on a pleather examination table secluded by a curtain and she'll take your temperature. The lights will be dim behind that curtain and you'll have the chance to quiet your mind and get some perspective on just what the hell Nora thought you two have been up to these past few months.

When the Nurse reads your thermometer and finds your temperature normal, she'll say, 'Tummy any better?'

Say, 'A little, yes.' You and the Nurse will be startled by the sudden calm in your voice. The Nurse will say, 'Your stomach didn't really hurt now did it?'

Shake your head no. 'Just don't make me go back to that conference room,' you'll plead. 'Can I just stay here and rest a little? My stomach doesn't hurt right now, but if I go back into that meeting, I really will get nauseous.'

The Nurse will ask, 'Do you want to talk about her?' She'll pat your hand and show you her most mothering face.

'The coworker I was cheating on my wife with broke it off with me,' tell her. Try not to cry. 'I thought we were on the same page the whole time. I didn't want to leave my wife and Nora didn't want to leave her husband, so we figured we'd just sneak around for a while.'

'But she changed her mind?' the Nurse will ask.

'She said she couldn't lie to him anymore,' say. You'll roll onto your side and curl up into a ball. 'I thought we really had something. It hurts so much.'

The Nurse will pat your hand. 'It gets better,' she'll say. 'You just have to get promoted. As you climb the ladder and make more money, you'll find that you're the one who's usually doing the dumping and running back to your wife.'

Tell her, 'But I have to see her every day. We're working on the Holtzman account together!'

'You just have to show up every day and show her that she can't keep you from doing what you're here to do,' the Nurse will say. 'Do your job better than anybody out there, and she'll see how little effect she had on you.'

You'll feel a little better. The nurse will give you heating pad and then leave you alone behind your curtain. Hold the heating pad tight and remember the last time you held Nora against you inside the handicapped women's room (single stall, locked door). Cry as much as you can behind that curtain, because once you unplug that heating pad and climb off the table, you've got work to do.

Happy Go To The Nurse Day!