Part One of The Early Years: My First Dingus Boss

So, over dinner the other night (cocktails, guacamole and these great pickles I get every week from the farmer’s market Pickle Guy) Lover Man and I were reminiscing about the jobs we had while on the way to something else.  For Lover Man, these were the jobs prior to his punk band management days. For me, it was everything I did prior to becoming an Executive Director at a smallish organization.

Except for the year I worked for a crooked lawyer, (who, before carted off to jail, remains the nicest boss I ever had), all the paid jobs I held prior to becoming a boss myself were physically demanding. 

My early jobs fell into two categories-jobs I hated and jobs I despised.

What moved the job hate/despise needle was the manager.

Our first job out of high school, my roommate, Rebel Girl and I worked at a record packing factory. (L.P. records, and yes, there was an entire factory devoted to this. Today it's done out of some guys basement).

We worked on the conveyer line where we pulled records and placed them vertically in a cardboard box.  Besides leg and foot cramps caused by standing on a concrete floor for hours, the job was simple.

What tipped this job into the despised camp was our manager, Fran (name not changed). Even today, my chest tightens just thinking about “FFFurAnnnn,” the Bitch of Highest Proportion (BoHP).

She seemed about 60 at the time but in hindsight she was probably in her 30's. Her shellacked black hair was teased into a high Diana Ross (Surpremes era) beehive. Her heavy black Cleopatra inspired eyeliner, her blue powder eyeshadow and bright pink no-fade Covergirl lipstick made Amy Winehouse (R.I.P., troubled child) seem demure. To complete her look, she wore nothing but pink. Typically this meant pink polyester pants, pink button up blouses and white vinyl boots.

The BoHP could have have been a beloved boss based on her strong fashion statement alone.

But no.

She had to go and ruin her admirable 1950‘s slut allure with her psychotic prison guard management techniques.

A stopwatch affixed to a pink lanyard around her neck, the BoHP was clearly proud of her ability to count to sixty. As in sixty seconds to a minute. Sixty minutes to an hour.

The BoHP’s expectation was that we would pack one record per second.  To ensure this, the BoHP  stood at the top of the line pounding a fist on her steel rolling desk. Like a loud and angry metronome, she counted out the seconds. “60! 59! 58! 57...”  If we missed more than three beats, she'd scream, "DOCUMENTED!!!!!"

We were allowed two 5-minute  bathroom breaks. Stepping back from the line announcing “Bathroom!,” the BoHP escorted you to the locked bathroom.  Standing outside the door, the BoHP counted down from from 5-minutes announcing each minute that passed. If you were still there at 04:30 minutes, the door opened as she screamed out the final thirty seconds.

At noon, punching out for our unpaid 30-minute lunch, the BoHP left us alone. If it was nice out, we ate at the old picnic tables in front of the factory.  Afraid of snitches, no one talked, complained or commiserated. Most of us didn’t even know each others names. Best to just look at the table.


We worked there for 6 months when on a Friday night, Rebel Girl
had an epiphany. “Let’s ‘borrow’ (her boyfriend) Rebel Guy’s convertible and drive to Colorado!!” Once during a visit with her Colorado Rebel Cousin, she was persuaded to try mushrooms. As a result, her psychedelic memory of Colorado is of candy-colored mountains, talking birds and stars that came down from the sky and hugged her. Ever since that visit she wanted to go back. “We can live in campsites ‘til the money runs out!” After about 5 seconds of deep thought, I agreed to skip out on our rent and head west with her.

The following day, we left a little before noon.  Rebel Girl decided we should drive past the Record Factory.  We slowed wayyyy down. It was a nice day so some of the employees were sitting silently at the picnic tables. Suddenly, Rebel Girl blasted the horn and like a punk rock prom queen, I stood and waved my longest finger in the air screaming "FFF-UCCCKKKK YOU, FFFFURANNNN!"

A few people looked up and smiled. Two guys that worked on my line tapped their chests with their fist. I like to think that the BoHP was watching and her stopwatch skipped a second.

Then, with the wind in our hair and Dark Side of the Moon blaring on the 8-track (an ancient portable machine used for music playback), we moved to Colorado and lived in the Rocky Mountain National Park for nearly six months.

Lest I further indulge in memories that often feel like they belong to someone I don't much know, here are the nuggets of management wisdom that I gleaned.

1. Mean bosses suck. Don't be one because actually, they more than suck. They are psychologically damaging. The impact of a temperament of someone like the BoHP could  be devastating-either internally (validating an already insecure employee's sense of worthlessness) or externally (exercising their right to bear arms and use them).

2. Work environments that feel like jail create employees that act like inmates.

As in prison, some of the personalities that emerge are:

•  "Fish" who are newcomers and targets for the prior newcomers
• "Rats" who seek preferential treatment from the guards by providing information to the  guards.
• "Gorillas" who seek respect from their peers through their unpredictability and general meanness.
• "Swag Men" who steal inexpensive items.
•  "Sheep" who are filled with fear.

3. Just because someone has an amazing sense of style doesn't mean they're cool.

4. Finally, sometimes running away is the best thing. Clears the mind. Gives you a new perspective. Keeps you from killing someone. Things like that.

For more information on inmate behavior check out:

Answering the Call with Barry Evert at  http://www.correctionsone.com/correctional-psychology/articles/3261117-The-4-inmate-personality-types/

Prisons: Prisoners - Inmate Subcultures And Informal Organizations - Inmates, Gang, and Roles

<a href="http://law.jrank.org/pages/1796/Prisons-Prisoners-Inmate-subcultures-informal-organizations.html">Prisons: Prisoners - Inmate Subcultures And Informal Organizations</a>

Criminogenic Effect of the Prison Environment on Inmate Behavior: Some Experiential Evidence by Scott D. Camp, PhD and Gerald G. Gaes, PhD for the National Institute of Justice http://www.bop.gov/news/research_projects/published_reports/cond_envir/camp_gaes_c&d.pdf

The Society of Captives by Gresham M. Sykes  https://www.msu.edu/~huebner2/CJ365/May%2030,%202001.PDF

Stay tuned because Part Two and Part Three of "The Early Years"will discuss what I learned as a waitress, which was my career of choice after I returned from Colorado and the effect Punk Rock had on my later career as a boss.

A SHOUT OUT to Lover Man for telling me my first version of this post sucked.

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