December 28, 2004
Also? In my home. This year, CD brought many of his Scandanavian traditions to life. We had traditional dinners, and gifts from elves, Advent candles, language lessons.
I've been reminded that our world has so many ways to celebrate this time of year - some as ancient as the land, others created in our lifetime. All meant to bring people together, joined with the spirits of goodwill and peace.
The darkness weakens.
The sun rises higher,
The frozen ground rejoices.
God grant you a Merry Yule,
And happy winter hours.
-Scandanavian Blessing
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December 27, 2004
To top it all off, one of the senior guys on my team delighted in doing the opposite of whatever I asked him to do. Because of him, I started each day with the breakfast of champions: 3 Tylenol and a cup of antacid.
Before that Christmas, I called a teleconference with this guy, Reed and myself. To call this guy on the carpet and demand a commitment that he change his behavior.
After the call, Reed asked me why I'd done that. Reed said that that I'd had no reason to embaress the man in front of his boss's boss.
I felt immediately ashamed.
What's really wrong? Reed asked me.
What's wrong? I repeated, near tears. What isn't wrong?
I gave him my litany - my first program with an 8-figure budget, incompetant vendors shipping product to the wrong locations, resources that were staging a slow-down because of layoff fears, yada yada yada....
Reed listened kindly and said And?
And? And What?
Nothing you haven't handled before. If on a smaller scale. So tell me, what's the real problem here?
Oh.
He spent about an hour then, chatting with me, until I realized what I was doing wrong and how to fix it. And never once did he tell me what to do.
You know, I worked for the Church for years. But it was Reed - a former soldier - who taught me some important lessons that I try and bring back to the center of my life each Christmas:
1) Don't judge a person by their worst trait or their worst day
2) Remember that a person's dignity is sacred. Do nothing to violate it.
3) Your problem with someone else is almost always that: your problem. Not theirs.
4) Everyone is carrying their own solutions with them. The most effective way to help someone out in the dark is not to push them where you think they should go. It is, instead, to become a flashlight for them to use in discovering their own way out.
5) Forgive. Especially yourself.
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December 22, 2004
Our Christmas Tree, 12/2004
Well, family lands tomorrow so I guess, yes, there really is a Christmas this year, Santa Claus. more...
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December 08, 2004
Previously, on Corporate Mommy...
This season, the previously light-hearted and laugh-filled world of Corporate Mommy took a serious turn when the Corporate Parents began grappling with the question of having more children. Not to say that the characters America has come to love weren't still delighting with their wacky adventures!
Yes, the hijinks continued as the Corporate Family tackled a 900-mile road trip with a loose door strapped to their van (".... it was like having a giant thudding vibrator strapped to our heads"), cheered their team on to winning the World Series (Begone! Curse of Danny Darwin!), and got anti-Political (“Really, what this election needs is a good swift kick in the butt by Miss Manners”) - all with their usual sangfroid.
Meanwhile, the storyline about fertility spun into an arc about the slow rift this sparked in the foundation of the Corporate Marriage.
In upcoming episodes, the antics of the Corporate Family will continue to be tempered by the gravitas of this crisis and the determination of this couple to find a way back to good – or even, hopefully, better.
About Corporate Mommy.
From the Emmy-winning writers/executive producers that brought you hits like “My Mother the Stapler” and “Hazel, The Teen-aged Tycoon”, Corporate Mommy chronicles the klutzy, chaotic and madcap adventures of a work-at-home mother juggling the corporate sharks in one hand and her 4-year-old wunderkind son in the other.
Picture Rhoda Morgenstern doing a craft with birdseed, peanut butter and curling ribbon while managing a 7-figure budget review over her headset. Corporate Mommy is the family sitcom that brings the boardroom into the dining room.
Who can forget the time she tried to get mascara off her tongue before a big client meeting? Or the time she just missed hitting the ‘mute’ button before her son told a co-worker about her breasts?
On a given day, Elizabeth might find herself explaining to her employees the difference between their corporate emails and startrek.alt.newsgroup or putting out a house fire in her living room. The world of Corporate Mommy is a wild and unpredictable ride!
As a mother working in senior management, Corporate Mommy (Elizabeth) faces the challenge of so many modern parents - finding balance. Often is the time that a 2-hour teleconference on determining the earned value of a program seems like a nice break from chasing an active and precocious preschooler. While her husband envies her easy commute (down the hall) and her “business casual” attire (jeans); she envies his escape to a world full of other adults each day.
Elizabeth's huband, Corporate Daddy (CD), is a tall, dark, and quiet Scandinavian who is the perfect foil for his short, curvy and blonde wife. CD happily indulges his Elizabeth’s love of FarScape, and freely admits he said “I love you” first. As well as his IT career and his university studies in robotics, CD’s most compelling interest is in being a great father.
But the breakout star of this family sitcom is undeniably Corporate Son (Bear). You've seen his coppery good looks on the covers of "Toddler Times" and "PreSchooler Beat". A long-awaited Miracle Baby, BearÂ’s passions include outsmarting his babysitter, snappy comebacks., music (dancing, listening, encouraging, even discussing Warren Zevon tunes), and recording his poopies for posterity. BearÂ’s sweetness is, by now, legendary. His career goal is to become the Blue Power Ranger.
Check your local listings and join the Corporate Mommy family of fans today!
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But, also hoping that there's a happy ending in store, and no more "very special" corporate mommy episodes for a good long while. 67 queries taking 0.0733 seconds, 180 records returned.
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