If you haven’t been paying close attention, and why would you what with all that self-righteousness clouding your egotistical tunnel vision (kidding, I love you guys), you might have missed that this is my 200th post. In some ways this makes me happy, and in some ways it makes me sick to my stomach. On the one hand, it’s another 200 posts I’ll be able to show my children someday when it’s time for them to understand why their mommy sometimes drinks Guiness before noon. That’s noble. On the other, though, what have I achieved?
200 posts -- hundreds of opportunities to do something truly great like solve the Chad-Sudan conflict or raise enough money to purchase my own barn full of Lipizzaner stallions -- but all I have to show for it is a nice apartment, a good man, a steady income, a modicum of praise and adulation and excellent health. Basically I'm not any closer to meeting George Clooney, so what's the point?
In celebration of my milestone, I went through my 'drafts' folder (which is a glorified 'ideas' folder, containing snippets like "Red wine emails are emails of righteousness") and cleaned it out. I got rid of everything that wasn’t good (99%) and was left with this: an account of the bizarre inner-workings of small town museums, and how I navigated those tricky waters. I had written it some time ago as an email to my friends but never posted. So I figure why not retell the story here? We’ll call it closure – both on the horrific memory, and on another year of putting the English language to bad use:
I had to be at work this morning to welcome the Scottish Vernacular Society of the Boring and Horribly Infirm (SVSBHI) to a morning of titillating discovery at the FFM.
Hold on, I need to give you some backstory first:
So when I applied for the curator position back in October I threw a hail mary by starting my coverletter with 'I know I am ridiculously underqualified for this job...' and crossed my fingers. I got called in for an interview and some days later underwent the most grueling panel of interviewees the world has ever known. Included on this panel was a woman named Paula, but for the purposes of this post will be called Dr. Ironsides. She is about 54, has a severe haircut, and doesn't wear makeup. She also had on polarfleece, an otherwise minor aside, but seeing as everyone else (including me) was wearing suits I found her sporty, lightweight choice a little unsettling. See, the thing about the polarfleece is that she wears it because WHO WILL SAY ANYTHING TO HER. No one. And that is because she is Dr. Ironsides and she will destroy your soul.
Ok, so round about December I was lucky enough to be appointed co-curator with another woman named Maryanne who was a Kiwi and well versed in the administrative side of running a museum. The idea was that we would double-team this operation; I'm sure you're familiar with the whole 'two heads are better than one' song-and-dance. Personally, I know I would rather have just the one head, but apparently you need two heads to run a museum. I'm pretty sure Dr Ironsides has two heads; she has the one with the severe hair cut and another one she uses to commune with the devil.
The idea was that Maryann would start work a few months before me and get a lot of the admin finished so I could come in and tidy up the collection in April. While I was away in France with Jamie I got a funny email from Wynne, the indispensable and positively LOVELY secretary of the trust, saying that 'something horrible had happened and would I mind giving her a call at my earliest possible convenience?' I rang her up to find everyone in an uproar over the latest scandal that had rocked the board of trustees and shaken the very fibre of the village itself: Maryann had an affair with Iain! Valerie had walked in on them in bed together! Oh, the drama. Valerie and Iain, both trustees, resigned from the board (I guess to have more time to work on their divorce), and Maryanne skipped town in a torrent of shame. I'm not sure, but I think Valerie may have had just enough time to pin Maryanne down and carve a scarlet A into her chest before she left; she is a fierce lady, that V.
[An aside about Valerie: she offered to 'take me to the pub and get me piss drunk' the first time she met me. She's white-headed and somewhere in the range of 60-70. Naturally, I love her.]
So, Dr Ironsides? Apparently she was involved in the scandal as well, although the details of that have yet to be revealed, because a few days later she resigned as chairman (chairwoman?) of the board. There was much shuffling around, and once all the chips had fallen Marion (the new chairman) and I emerged like a brilliant, two-headed pheonix from the ashes of the FFM. So I guess sometimes it's ok to have two heads.
I slipped into my new job and my newly empty office with zest; Dr Ironsides was gone and all my days would be happy and full of tea-time and laughing with Wynne. UNTIL TODAY. I was pulling up the shades of the weigh house as the coach for the SVSEHI rolled into the car park. I watched as the bluehairs piled out of the coach and walked over the burn towards the museum. I thought that David, my furniture professor, might be in the group so I was watching everyone come across and looking for him when... I saw her. I froze. My heart jumped into my mouth and I actually said 'oooh craaaap' at the glass. She was bringing up the rear of the group, camera around her neck, and was squinting up at the museum windows. I'm sure she saw me. She probably has super-polarfleece-vision and sonic hearing. She probably heard me say 'crap' from inside the museum. She probably heard my thoughts, the scream of my soul.
I bumbled around trying to look busy by making sure everyone had museum guides and the proper group badges. Meanwhile, Ironsides was nowhere to be seen, so I slipped across the road to the extension (where my office, the gift shop, and the rotating exhibit room is) to grab my keys. I turned the corner into my office... and there she was. On my computer. At my desk. I hope she could hear my thoughts because they went something like this: WHAT THE H LADY.
She didn't turn around, just stroked the right arm of my desk chair and said 'I see you have installed broadband. How very good of you.' I looked around for a gun or a shovel, and finding neither I merely said 'oh, yes, thankyou Paula, haha.' My desk chair swivels like all good desk chairs do (I know this because I have spent up to six or seven minutes going around in circles after everyone else leaves), and Ironsides used that to its fullest dramatic potential by sweeping around and piercing me with her icy stare. 'I trust you are getting on well enough without Maryanne' she growled. 'Oh yes, Ha Ha' Then there was a seventeen minute block of silence where we merely stared at each other like two cougars. 'Right. Well, I'll leave you to it. Remember what you owe to this museum, and to this village' she said. 'I'll be watching you."
As if the whole exchange wasn't awkward enough, I looked down and saw a corner of familiar paper sticking out of her bag. I froze. It was my expense report! And not just a copy of it -- the whole spiral notebook detailing three years' worth of petty cash records. I gulped. It was one of those 'do or die' moments. I was through being nice, I was through saying Ha HA. I lunged for the notebook and pulled it halfway out of her purse before she grabbed my wrist with her icy monkey claw.
"What do you think you're doing?" I hissed.
"You have to give this to me. I need it. I have to have it!"
At that point we were literally playing tug-of-war with the notebook; my hair actually came out of its ponytail holder during the tussle.
Maybe it was the hair in my face, or the wild look in her eyes, but something told me this was not a fight I could win. I could feel my accountability slipping and so I released my end of the prize. She stumbled backward in surprise, and looked at me with the most disdain a human being can muster. She threw the notebook on my desk like a dead fish and stormed out of the office.
A few days later I heard she had driven her car off the road and quit her job (not necessarily in that order), and that she was going to live with her son in Devon for a while to "regroup." I'll never know what to make of our last encounter, but sometimes I wonder if the expense report could have set her free?
