weekend?” Tracy the receptionist says when I finally call the office. I’m standing on the lower level of the United terminal at LAX waiting for the car. Technically, I’m outside, but given the concrete overpass above me and all the traffic and exhaust down here, I might as well be in another of Dante’s circles of hell. The one he happened to miss by about seven hundred years.
“My weekend? Fabulous,” I shout over the roar of traffic, because honestly, given how much I had been dreading the whole
Meet the Parents
weekend, it had turned out great. Better than great. Not only was it fine being home again and Jack and Helen had totally hit it off with Charles — even the cocktail party was fun, and my gift bags of Heritage apples were as much a hit with the suburban crowd as my boyfriend — but Charles and I were back to normal. After weeks, months, of feeling like we had been drifting apart, pulled away by our jobs and living in two different cities, it finally seemed like we were back to where we were when we first started going out.
Still, I’m hardly going to share all that with our receptionist. Not that my relationship with Charles is a secret. But I’m just not crazy about having the nuances of it broadcast all over the office. That’s the downside of a workplace romance. Everybody knows way too much about your life. Your sex life. And it’s even worse if, despite your best efforts, it all goes horribly wrong, and then what are you left with? Sympathetic glances and whispers from co-workers, and worse, their assistants, who still have to work with both of you. Alex Davidson: Chief Spinster in Charge. Or something to that effect.
Never mind that Suzanne was one of those brave eternally single women who plowed into their fifties with their unmarried heads held high. Symphony subscriptions. Book clubs. Pilates. A
full
life. Compared to her, I’m pathetic. Still, God knows, given the right job,
my
job, for instance, work could — would — eat you alive. Before you know it, you’re in your forties, still single, still exhausted, and wondering how you missed the turnoff back there in your thirties: MARRIAGE, NEXT EXIT . It had taken me years since my divorce to find a guy normal enough,
willing
enough, to go the boyfriend-girlfriend route. Besides, after this past weekend, I’m even more convinced that the only thing wrong with us is the fact that we don’t spend enough time together. Still, the lower level of LAX at rush hour is hardly the spot to ponder one’s place in the cosmos.
“So is Caitlin there?” I yell over the traffic, trying to move things along.
“She’s not back from lunch yet. Do you want me to put you through to her voice mail?”
“No, just tell her to call me on my cell when she gets back.” I’m tempted to add “unless, of course, I beat her back to the office,” which is always a possibility, given Caitlin’s deeply appreciative attitude toward lunch and time away from the office in general. What is with that generation? Even worse than the baby boomers and their sense of entitlement. At least they were willing to work for the BMW and the Sub-Zero. “Is Steven there?” I add.
“I think he’s still at the walk-through with the magazine,” Tracy says. “Do you want his assistant?”
Not really. “Sure, put Aaron on.”
I get up to speed, or as much as I can take in, given the jet-lagged-dehydrated-carbon-dioxide-fume fog that is my brain at the moment.
“You can also try him on his cell,” Aaron says.
“That’s okay,” I holler. “I can barely hear you. I’ll just see him when I get to the office.”
I click off and scan the line of traffic for the car. All the exhaust is giving me a headache. What was the car number again? BLS1049. 1059? Well, they usually have your name on a card in the window. I pull out my BlackBerry and start to scroll down the list of e-mails. Jennifer. Oscar. Steven.
E.T
. Two publicists from another agency. A million from
“My weekend? Fabulous,” I shout over the roar of traffic, because honestly, given how much I had been dreading the whole
Meet the Parents
weekend, it had turned out great. Better than great. Not only was it fine being home again and Jack and Helen had totally hit it off with Charles — even the cocktail party was fun, and my gift bags of Heritage apples were as much a hit with the suburban crowd as my boyfriend — but Charles and I were back to normal. After weeks, months, of feeling like we had been drifting apart, pulled away by our jobs and living in two different cities, it finally seemed like we were back to where we were when we first started going out.
Still, I’m hardly going to share all that with our receptionist. Not that my relationship with Charles is a secret. But I’m just not crazy about having the nuances of it broadcast all over the office. That’s the downside of a workplace romance. Everybody knows way too much about your life. Your sex life. And it’s even worse if, despite your best efforts, it all goes horribly wrong, and then what are you left with? Sympathetic glances and whispers from co-workers, and worse, their assistants, who still have to work with both of you. Alex Davidson: Chief Spinster in Charge. Or something to that effect.
Never mind that Suzanne was one of those brave eternally single women who plowed into their fifties with their unmarried heads held high. Symphony subscriptions. Book clubs. Pilates. A
full
life. Compared to her, I’m pathetic. Still, God knows, given the right job,
my
job, for instance, work could — would — eat you alive. Before you know it, you’re in your forties, still single, still exhausted, and wondering how you missed the turnoff back there in your thirties: MARRIAGE, NEXT EXIT . It had taken me years since my divorce to find a guy normal enough,
willing
enough, to go the boyfriend-girlfriend route. Besides, after this past weekend, I’m even more convinced that the only thing wrong with us is the fact that we don’t spend enough time together. Still, the lower level of LAX at rush hour is hardly the spot to ponder one’s place in the cosmos.
“So is Caitlin there?” I yell over the traffic, trying to move things along.
“She’s not back from lunch yet. Do you want me to put you through to her voice mail?”
“No, just tell her to call me on my cell when she gets back.” I’m tempted to add “unless, of course, I beat her back to the office,” which is always a possibility, given Caitlin’s deeply appreciative attitude toward lunch and time away from the office in general. What is with that generation? Even worse than the baby boomers and their sense of entitlement. At least they were willing to work for the BMW and the Sub-Zero. “Is Steven there?” I add.
“I think he’s still at the walk-through with the magazine,” Tracy says. “Do you want his assistant?”
Not really. “Sure, put Aaron on.”
I get up to speed, or as much as I can take in, given the jet-lagged-dehydrated-carbon-dioxide-fume fog that is my brain at the moment.
“You can also try him on his cell,” Aaron says.
“That’s okay,” I holler. “I can barely hear you. I’ll just see him when I get to the office.”
I click off and scan the line of traffic for the car. All the exhaust is giving me a headache. What was the car number again? BLS1049. 1059? Well, they usually have your name on a card in the window. I pull out my BlackBerry and start to scroll down the list of e-mails. Jennifer. Oscar. Steven.
E.T
. Two publicists from another agency. A million from
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