Ch ch ch changes...

I hate change. I try to avoid it at all costs. But change is inevitable. And sometimes, change ultimately causes evolutions of good things.

When I started my new job, everything was foreign, strange, confusing, and I was stumbling in the unfamilarness that was tripping me constantly. My first sales call was nerve wracking, meeting my first, new customer, introducing myself to all the associated staff within that account after driving in circles trying to find the blasted building. I nervously walked in, all faux confident, shiny, overly eager to make a decent impression.

I was greeted by two monstrous-sized, curt, awful gatekeepers, who made it crystal clear that they didn't care who I was, or what I wanted. Picture Ursula's two pet sea eels in The Little Mermaid. They knew why I was there, and gave me a slight head jerk to indicate "come on in" in their sub primate language. I was instructed to "sit here" and wait. I felt like I had just entered a women's prison. No one glanced in my direction nor acknowledged my presence. I was invisible. Talk about a place "...where everybody knows your name..."NOT!

Suddenly, I hear jubilant sorority screams and giggles. It was difficult to imagine the two sea eels emitting these sounds of happiness from their evil souls. It was another female, very pregnant rep, coming for a visit~ enter the flawless, surreal rock star of a girl. The urchins were hanging on the prego rocker's every word, grinning from ear to ear, one of them revealing a mouthful of rotted choppers.

They were exchanging stories about pregnancy, delivery, babies, kids...all subjects I LOVE to gab about~ I wanted to join in, but it was not my time or my place. Prego rocker was in the spotlight, I was just an outsider. I was shrouded with uncertainty and being new, so I sat there. Alone and quiet, looking at my shoes. Pathetic? Yes.

One year later, I have shed the newness, and opened myself up to get to know these STRANGErs, embracing the changes. As I entered this same account last week, rotted chopper urchin, greeted me with a HUGE, unexpected hug and called me "hun". Hun? We've come a long way, baby.