My Secret Identity

I haven't talked much about my job since I got it. That's because it's perfectly odious, and I can't talk about it without cussing. I try to avoid the subject. Particularly on my blog. I somehow feel like I should stick to the positive here. I wonder why that is?

So, I'm a proofreader at a civil engineering office. To pay our astronomical Vancouver rent, I spend my days reading and correcting 40-page building code reports written by men whose first languages are Romanian, Mandarin, Bengali. The grammar isn't pretty. Nothing about the office is pretty. It's a monochrome wasteland that reeks of toner. I had wondered what engineers do. Now I know, and I wish I didn't.

When I'm there, I feel like the odd one out in a sci fi movie, like I need to hide something about myself so I don't get chewed up by the machine that detects difference. Like I have a secret identity. These people don't even know what gels or primers are. Imagine!

Last week I found out that I'm not the only one with a secret identity. One of the guys with an office near mine has always seemed like the odd man out. He's a hugely tall, jovial guy who listens to loud music on his headphones. He's middle-aged, but he looks like he thinks he's a kid someone's let into the boardroom by mistake. He doesn't seem to love his job as much as everyone else does - he sometimes leaves early, and doesn't obsess about architectural drawings. I put it down to his being in sales.

He mentioned he was taking a week off, to go fishing. I overheard him say he was going to the Queen Charlotte Islands. The Charlottes are possibly my favorite place in the whole world, so of course I had to ask him for more details. He was very vague, and rushed off without saying much. I figured he was in a hurry right then, and asked him again later, and mentioned that I had been there to collect moss. He raised an eyebrow, and I ended up explaining my story, complete with biology degrees and trip through Latin America in a hippie bus.

Somewhere in the middle of my story, he started to look shamefaced. At the end, he said he couldn't lie anymore, he wasn't going fishing after all. Instead, he was going to spend time at a recording studio, producing music for a young songwriter who's just starting out. He pulled a chain out from under his tie to show me the peace sign dangling from it, and said in a hushed voice that he didn't want anyone to know he's a hippie.

We agreed to keep each other's secret identities hush-hush.

I promise an installment about Seline and Dylan's wedding very soon! We're still working on the photos, and I can't post without photos...