AVP-Ness

A middle-management banking title, AVP (Assistant Vice President) can mean whatever the company wants it to.  In my case, it appears to mean more to my employer than it does to other banks, as it’s defined with a higher pay band than the junior-level exempt positions, whilst other banks tend to use it solely to define a more senior employee, often devoid of significant pay delineation.  But regardless the salary details, the title identifies a certain managerial level–one specifically higher than a mere supervisor who manages a team’s time cards.

I am, at present, an AVP of Marketing Email Management (AVP, Email Manager, to be exact).

And with that grossly uninteresting introduction, I’ll segue to the actual joke.  As Liz also holds an AVP title at a financial company, we have modified the title in self-mockery of who we’ve become in regards to such socioeconomic standing.  We call it AVP-Ness (say it out loud if you’re having trouble getting it).  Clever, I know.  But it serves a useful function.  It’s a reminder to appreciate what we have and to keep hubris in check, as while job success requires a certain degree of experience and ability, possessing these qualities alone doesn’t guarantee success, to which anyone underemployed can attest.

And AVP-Ness can creep up unexpectedly.  But I will be the first to admit it!  Here are some examples:

Why tomatoes? Because I’m using land to cultivate a rather low-energy plant just because I find them tasty–indicative that I have no need for subsistence farming.
Let’s face it: whippets are elitist. They’re expensive and fairly useless as a utility dog. Plus, we give it blankets and let it on the furniture.
I don’t think a cheese tray warrants further explanation here.
Caviar–expensive and arguably damaging to the species.

And there you have it.  We have achieved success, but in the spirit of the Holidays and in the words of Bing Crosby, and overlooking the religious implications of the exact wording, “I count my blessings”, because “when my bankroll is getting small I think of when I had none at all”.

Hoping everyone had a good Christmas!

–Simon

Luck

Falling somewhat behind on my posts over the holiday, I’m going to throw out one of those lazy “Here’s a random picture with some commentary” posts.

Behold:

I’ve never seen a five-leaf clover.

The internet tells me it’s called a “Rose Clover”, and will bring me wealth.  Woohoo!

–Simon

Ode to that Tiny Fleck of Debris That Won’t Dislodge from my Eyeglasses

Static cling or Van der Waals?
You grasp eternally
Upon the lens, you won’t let go
A force of air
I breathe upon
The tiny speck–a mighty foe
Calm turns into fury.

I’m huffing, puffing, wheezing
Tenacity, I think
I will not touch the lens, to smear
And so I blow
Until at last
Expectorate, my greatest fear
I wash now in the sink.

Forced Childhood

Every artist has their medium.  Snow is not my daughter’s.  My theory (based on the current state of her basement art studio), is that snow is too monochrome (#FFFFFF is sooo pedestrian).

Yet this irritates me, probably due to my own childhood memories.  Texas didn’t offer much in the way of snow, and as our culture as a whole is heavily influenced by the Midwest and New England and their associated images of holiday blizzards, Christmas time always carried with it a bit of melancholy as I peered out the window across a wind-swept and barren Dust Bowl landscape.  I never once rode a sled in my childhood, and on only one notable occasion do I remember building a snowman (to which my dad added breasts, followed by mom administering a mastectomy via garden trowel).

I am NOT having fun

But the joke’s on this youngest generation.  Climate change will either warm the region beyond the point of regular snow, or cool it to the point that it destroys us.  Either way, those quaint Rockwellian scenes will vanish alongside the planet’s biodiversity.  And I, Dad, will mock my child for her youthful indifference.

–Simon

Social Interactions

A pretty young woman smiled at me in the grocery store.

This is noteworthy for a couple reasons.  Firstly, it’s rare that anyone makes eye contact with me.  Sure, I could bemoan the sad state of our current society, wherein we shun our fellow humans as simple and inconvenient co-habitants of the environment, but I doubt that the explanation is so simple.  Perhaps it’s because we work ourselves to exhaustion and simply don’t have the mental reserves to allocate to simple camaraderie–or by the same argument, we don’t have enough time.

Second, based on simple observations of a personal lifetime, it’s rare that women in passing find me terribly attractive, or (as it’s been mentioned on one particular account) approachable.  Maybe I should shave the mustache?  Nah.

In any case, the scenario usually plays out as me approaching a woman’s proximity for unrelated reasons, at an indirect vector, and I–being cognizant of another sentient being, offer the most basic of friendly gestures–a smile.  But rarely is this sentiment properly delivered, for the woman never acknowledges my own existence, and even seems to make a conceited effort to avoid the mere awareness of another living being.  Ah well, that’s par really.

But a pretty young woman smiled at me!

Why would she do such a thing?  Did she need assistance?  No–she was merely pushing a cart.  And I didn’t have the kid with me (which is generally the only time women acknowledge me).  Could it be possible that she felt a simple and basic connection to another living being?  There’s more to this.  Let’s figure it out!

I didn’t have time to take a cursory glace at her cart’s contents, but she had chosen the full-sized version.  Was she shopping for her family?  She was on the cusp of being too young for me, and usually women that age aren’t performing full grocery runs.  Maybe she was practically frugal?  I dunno.  I don’t have enough information to make a proper analysis, and all conclusions are mere conjecture.

But a pretty young woman smiled at me!

Maybe it was the mere sight of a well-dressed man approaching her.  Could it be so simple?  Was it possible that there were other women in the world who found me not only mildly attractive at first glace, but also approachable–enough to risk encouraging me?

Perhaps she merely felt basic empathy for her fellow humans.  I’m no stranger to isolation, and the detrimental consequences of extended solitude.  I recall my clinical psychology course in college, which recounted the sad tale of a lonely man who’s last written words were that he was headed to The Bridge, and if just one person would smile at him during his journey, he wouldn’t jump.  Things did not work out so well.  Not one soul in San Francisco between him and the apex of the expanse bothered to acknowledge him.  Maybe this woman was aware of this story.  Maybe she knew the power of a simple gesture–the way it flooded my neurons with dopamine and brought me momentary peace and contentment.  I longed shake her hand or proffer a high-five–some minimally-invasive action that would allow me to perceive her existence in a tactile manner, to prove and acknowledge that she was the tangible being that brought me so much ephemeral joy.

Maybe she was the one on the bridge, reaching out to someone in the most subtle of ways–too afraid to do more–crying out to a world that doesn’t care if we continue to exist.  I should do something.

A pretty young woman smiled at me!

I didn’t do anything.  I thought for so long about the encounter’s implications that we passed, and I never even smiled back.

–Simon