ninanevermore

Today on my drive into work, I was thinking about how next week my former boss at the Toll Road Authority will be very anxious that I might do something nice for her. Friends who still work there have told me that she usually takes a few days off around August 13th, just in case I might do something nice. What makes her quake in her boots like this? Flowers – she's afraid she might get some.

The first part of August 2001 was a whirlwind for me. On Friday, August 10th of that year, I got an outstanding performance review, a promotion and a raise. Then, on Monday, August 13th, I was handed a letter saying that they had "lost confidence in my abilities" and was ordered to clean out my desk. I won't go into the details. Lets sum it up by saying that government work is funny; if the right people like you, you can do no wrong. However, if the right people don't like you, you can do no right. The politics of working in the public sector aren't much different than those of corporate America, except they are exaggerated by 100 fold.

A year later I was established in a new job where I made more money and didn't have to put up with near the same amount of stress. It made me think that Anita, my boss at the Toll Road Authority, had done me a favor. Sure, at the time I felt sore. No one likes to be fired from a job that they hoped to quit in a few months. But by getting let go at the time I was, I was in the right place at the right time to get my new job. It all worked out for the best and I thought I should let Anita know. Since she loved to receive flowers, I decided to send her some as a gesture of thanks.

I went on line and I found the perfect bouquet - a plum-colored vase filled with plum-colored Gerbera daisies, one of Anita's favorite types of flowers. The arrangement was called "Plum Crazy," which made it even more perfect since the general consensus around the TRA that Anita was, indeed, crazy.

She was hard to work for because it was like working for two people with entirely different expectations. On the days she came into the office singing to herself and smiling, I didn't mind her. She loved us; she gave us compliments and hugs and told us how wonderful we were to work with. On the days she came in scowling, we were liable to be written up for the same things that made us model employees 24 hours earlier. I learned to read her and work around both of her personalities, but the effort wears a person down after a few years.

I ordered the flowers and sent them with a note that read to the effect of: I just wanted to thank you for firing me a year ago today! I'm making for money and I actually like my new boss. I am so much happier that I can't even begin to describe it. None of this would have been possible if not for you.

I then called a friend at the TRA to have her keep an eye out for the bouquet and to let me know the reaction they got. The rest of the story I only have this person's word for. When the flowers arrived, the receptionist called Anita to come and pick them up. When she saw them her face lit up and she began to gush about how beautiful they were. She whisked the vase back to her desk, where I suppose she read the card. A few minutes later, she came back to the receptionist's deck holding the vase out in front of her at arm's length like a dead skunk. She set them down on the front desk with a thud.

"I think I'll leave these out here, so that everyone can enjoy them," she said.

If she had kept them in her office and thrown them away as left for the night, it would have been a little secret between she and I. But by leaving them on the front desk, the news spread throughout the entire building by that afternoon. People came up to the receptionist's desk in pairs and groups to whisper, "Are these them?" and laugh as they walked away. People who never met me while I worked there knew my name after that day.

To make it better, the bouquet lasted close to two weeks before the daisies started to droop and the receptionist got to take the pretty plum-colored vase home with her. For two weeks, everyone in the office looked at them and snickered. When the plaza managers showed up for their weekly meetings, they got to hear the story and carry it back with them out to the plazas. For two weeks, Anita had to see them every morning when she walked in the office and every evening when she went home. I think they were worth every penny of the $40 I spent on them.

Anita takes a vacation this time of year, even though I haven't sent her any flowers since 2002. She once told me that she adored Gerbera daisies and even grew them around her house. Now, every time she looks at them I know she thinks of me.