The Undercover Introvert

Close the Door on Your Way Out, 2020

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What can I say about 2020 that hasn’t already been growled between gritted teeth by someone, somewhere on this planet? It’s certainly been a year that defies simplistic definitions. A time warp. A lengthy, shimmering interlude between one moment and the next. A dumpster fire. An extended period of forced, yet not altogether unpleasant calm. A struggle. A hazy, indeterminate dream state. A nightmare. Never ending. Lightning fast. Upheaval incarnate.

In other words, it’s been one hell of a year.

Living through a global pandemic wasn’t something I had on my Bingo card last New Year’s Eve, and the year I thought I was strutting into on January 1st, 2020 didn’t even begin to resemble the year I’m looking back on during this final day of December. But the one thing I’m left with at the end of this strange 12 months is just how damned lucky I am. I did more than live through a year that saw close to 350,000 Americans die and millions more lose their livelihoods. I was able to spend 2020 quarantining with the people I care about most in the world while working full time in the safe, comfy cocoon of my own home. I didn’t struggle with food insecurity. I didn’t worry about being evicted in the middle of a health crisis. I kept my medical insurance and was able to seek care whenever I needed it.

This year has been horrible in so many ways, but I can’t deny how fortunate I am. So instead of shooting 2020 a double bird as it rides off into the blazing sunset, I’m going to give thanks. It just seems warranted, doesn’t it? And it’s an extension of the practice I began at the beginning of the year whenever I started to lament at how awful and uncertain things seemed.

I had all my people with me

At the end of December, I like to write out a list of my goals for the upcoming year, and then I read over them every morning to keep myself focused as the months pass. I did this for 2020 as well. Why am I telling you this? Well, my job is the type that normally keeps me on the move. Florida’s a big state and I’m often driving hundreds of miles every week for meetings, events, and conferences. So, in January, one of my goals was to prioritize spending quality time with my family. Remember that old adage: be careful what you wish for? Seems 2020 came equipped with jokes and thought that it would grant my wish by giving me nothing but family time. Although there have been a few moments when we all considered killing each other, this time together has truly been a gift. COVID slowed my ass down, kicking travel out of bounds and shutting down my usual get togethers with friends. I’m grateful to have been able to weather this stormy year with the people I cherish most. I know not everyone had that, and many now have empty chairs at their dining room tables.

I got by with a little help from my friends

Shockingly, my introverted ass has quite a few friends. And despite my critical need of alone time at regular intervals, hanging with these folks improves my life beyond what I might have earlier believed possible. I’m doubly fortunate that many of the people I consider close friends are also work associates, meaning we see each other at conferences and meetings that then transition into happy hours at various restaurants (yes, all my friends like food; you can’t hang with me if you don’t). My final work related trip in 2020 was for a big conference in DC the first week of March, just before everything shut down. We had a large group from Florida, which resulted in a good time during and after the conference, and a few of us stayed extra days to have unencumbered fun in the city. Before leaving for DC, I’d gotten the chance to see several other friends throughout February, which proved fortuitous, considering the world slammed shut the week I returned home, clearing my calendar of all in person events, both professional and social.

I fell into a virtual happy hour that first Friday of my self-imposed COVID quarantine that became a regular occurrence throughout the remainder of the year. It quickly transformed into the highlight of my week, a wine soaked therapy session that always started with complaints and ended with maniacal laughter. I had many other virtual get togethers with other sets of friends too, and meandering chat threads filled with frustration, profanity, jokes, and memes about politics and the pandemic. I missed seeing my friends in person, sharing appetizers and desserts over drinks, watching movies in the theater, or driving into the city for events or shows. But it never felt like they were that far away, even the ones from out of state. This year would have been insurmountable without each and every one of these folks. We got each other through this, with humor and humility. I can’t wait to see them all on the other side of this long, strange trip that was 2020.

Home was where the work was

I spent years as a freelance writer, followed by work on different political campaigns and then nonprofit organizations, including one I co-founded. Suffice to say, I’m used to working from home. But I’m also used to being able to leave when I want (or even when I don’t want, holding a knife to my own throat to force my feet out of the door), so it was pretty weird to never need to attend in person meetings or events. And it took time to fully assimilate into the Zoom industrial complex wherein what normally could have been a 20 minute phone call transformed into a 60 minute video conference complete with slide deck and unnecessary icebreakers and breakout groups (the horror). But even during the days stacked high with 6 plus Zoom meetings, I knew how fortunate I was.

I live in a state that buckled immediately under the pressure of the COVID-19 fueled unemployment crisis. To this day, there are still thousands of people that never received any unemployment benefits and are facing complete financial destruction as they hover on the edge of eviction, unable to afford their basic needs. There are other folks that managed to keep their jobs, but were forced to work outside of their homes. This wasn’t without risk, considering our state never had any discernible leadership from our incompetent governor or something as simple and obvious as a mask mandate. Unsurprisingly, our COVID-19 infection rates soared.

But somehow, inexplicably, I was okay. I stayed employed. I didn’t fall into financial ruin. I could afford food, a roof over my head, medical care. What made me so lucky when millions of others spiraled into poverty, their livelihoods and peace of mind evaporating in an instant? I don’t have the answer to this question. But I do feel an obligation to continue working to create an America that’s freer, fairer, and better for all of us. One with safety nets that actually catch us when we fall…or when we’re pushed. It goes without saying that I don’t want to struggle, but, here’s the thing: I don’t want you to struggle either.

I let words be my refuge

Before I fell ass over teakettle into the exhilaratingly frustrating world of politics, I used to read north of 60 books each year. I just ran through them. I’ve always been a voracious reader, preferring the comfort of tucking into the pages of a book over most everything else. This year, I set a modest goal of reading 30 books, but by May, I had yet to read a single one. What can I say? The year started at a gallop with work and then took a turn into the surreal when the pandemic started, washing everything else away. It was all I could do to keep my head above water. Eventually, I had a come to Jesus meeting with myself, and kicked my own ass into gear. Once I actually got started, I never stopped. I had some great adventures this year, humming along in the colorful space between my ears. I finished my 30th book just the other day. And, more importantly, I rekindled the love of reading that I’ve had since I was a little girl. That’s something I plan to bring with me into 2021.

We flipped the goddamned White House

Y’all know I can’t end a list about all the things I’m grateful for in 2020 without including this one. I’ve been living in a state of persistent dread for the last 4 years, a weight I forgot I was lugging around until it lifted, as though by magic, the Saturday after Election Day when Joe Biden was officially named President-Elect. I’ve never felt more relieved in my life, and I’ve given birth to a child. It’s strange to wish the last 4 years had never happened while also feeling deep, unshakeable gratitude for the person I became because of the gauntlet of stress and terror the Trump presidency forced me to cross. I didn’t have a purpose before this, not really, and now I do. Thanks to the work that millions of us did over the last 48 months, I get to keep the purpose while Trump has to vacate the White House. Beautiful, right?

As we show 2020 the door and lock up securely as soon as it crosses the threshold, lest it change its fickle mind, let’s take a moment to celebrate the small victories and soaring triumphs. If you’re reading this, you made it. You survived one of the worst years in living memory. I hope you also found pockets of joy, had those you loved close at hand, and found other small pleasures that made these odd days pass more easily. On the eve of 2021, here’s to many more years together doing what we love. Here’s to better times. Here’s to you, to me, to us.

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Quarantine Diary: I haven’t Worn Real Pants in 5 Weeks

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I’m not leaving the house much anymore, so figured I’d start a blog series to share updates of my oh-so-interesting-life-in-quarantine. My (lack of) exploits, thoughts, struggles, and, most importantly, snack choices. What better way to be alone, together than to provide these in depth peeks into my life that no one asked for!

Full disclosure: as an introvert, much of my regular life mirrors what would strictly be defined as quarantine conditions. My ideal day involves rising early, going for a run, listening to a podcast until I sit down at my computer to read articles while drinking several cups of coffee, having a small lunch while researching or doing some work in complete silence (my dog lightly snoring in her fluffy bed positioned within petting distance of my desk). Once I’m finished working for the evening and the end of my ideal day creeps nearer on sleepy feet, I have something delicious to eat for dinner, read or watch TV for the remainder of the night, and then hop into bed with my aforementioned snuggly dog. Did you notice that my ideal day involves never speaking to another human being? Yeah. Introverts did social distancing waaaaaaay before it went (involuntarily) mainstream.

To kick off this first post in the Quarantine Diary series, I want to take you through a list of the things I’m no longer doing in this crazy, upside down, COVID-19 infected world:

Wearing underwear

If we’re going to get to know each other, I believe we should dive right in. No dipping your toes into the water around here. I’m shoving you straight into the middle of Lake TMI…

For background, I worked remotely before it was compulsory, and after my morning shower, I’d plop myself down in my office chair dressed in a t-shirt and sweatpants or ratty shorts and get to work. Admittedly, my habit was to go without underwear while working in my home office (because it’s constricting and stupid) and only put on a pair if I had to leave the comfort of my house to attend an event or meeting, which was most days of the week. But now I’m no longer leaving the house for work because all events and meetings have been canceled for the duration. So, naturally, I canceled underwear too.

I’ve seen plenty of women posting about giving their bras the middle finger during this crisis, and I applaud their collective enthusiasm. My personal preference is to wear a sports bra when working, but that’s how I’m most comfortable. To the ladies that have left all undergarments in the rearview, I salute you agents of unmitigated chaos! Give it a few weeks and I might be right there with you. Perhaps we can have a modern day bra burning in our backyards alone, together.

Putting on big girl clothes

It’s pretty much glorified pajamas over here all day, every damned day. I haven’t worn something that wasn’t crafted from stretchy, expanding waist-forgiving fabric in many wonderful weeks (years?). My standard outfit involves sweatpants or loose fitting shorts, a sports bra, and tank top. This outfit doesn’t change for Zoom meetings where I’m expected to turn on my camera. My secret: not giving a shit what I look like. It’s really great. You should try it. Pro tip: point the camera so it only shows from the top of your shoulders up. No one will be the wiser.

Shaving my legs

Ain’t nobody got time for this kind of negativity in their quarantine daily life. And since I’m neither leaving the house nor putting on the aforementioned big girl clothing, I really don’t see the need to shave my legs.

TBH, I’m becoming less presentable by the day and I couldn’t give fewer fucks. I have no idea how any of us are going to go back to the way things were when somewhat normal patterns of life resume. Once you’ve flown from the constricting, yet gilded cage of gendered standards of hygiene, how do you go back again? And, more importantly, will we even want to?

Driving my car

I run a statewide organization, mostly from my home office. But I travel my enormous state quite often for work, meaning I put some serious miles on the old sensible four door sedan. I actually don’t mind driving. It gives me some quiet time untethered from my computer and phone to center myself while I listen to the week’s podcasts. But I sure as hell don’t miss negotiating the shitty traffic in South Florida, Orlando, and Tampa. I don’t miss paying tolls either, or filling up with gas, or paying for a tire that blew out on one of our terrible highways. Unfortunately, despite my car sitting mostly unused in the driveway (save for biweekly grocery store runs), that loan payment is still spirited out of my account at the beginning of every month.

Acknowledging the existence of time

I think we can all agree that time is canceled. It just doesn’t exist anymore, at least not the way it used to. And, even if it did, we’ve moved beyond our childish dependence on it. If we must, we can still have the generic catchalls of yesterday, today, and tomorrow, but when we start trying to get all fancy by naming days of the week or what month it is, things go to hell in a hurry. Let’s stop pretending that March only lasted 31 days when we know damned well it was at least 125. And April is shaping up to be at least double that…

Working remotely only accelerates this gradual softening of time. When your job can be done at home, it means your work day never has to end. Ever. You can continue working late into the night, at the crack of dawn, during the weekend, or on holidays. It’s great! Now the days blend together, creeping past with painful slowness while simultaneously racing through your fingers. I swear it’s been at least 3 years since we started this social distancing stuff. But it’s also only been 15 minutes.

Here’s my promise to you, captive quarantine audience: as long as sheltering in place is our reality, you can expect moderately regular posts about the weird, wonderful, and banal things going on at Chez Moi. Remember all the beautiful letters and journals produced during other trying times in our history, like World War II or the Great Depression? Well, these posts won’t be that. I’ll mostly be talking about my snacking habits and dropping a cascade of F bombs. But if it helps get you through another 75 hour day, I’ll consider that a win.

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America, We Are Not Okay

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I recently went to lunch with my mom and one of her friends. We were looking forward to a nice, normal meal at a place my mom and I had never been. The food didn’t disappoint, but the conversation stuck with me long after we left the restaurant and went our separate ways. It underscored why I do this work and validated not just the need of it, but the obligation of doing it if you find yourself in a position that allows you to dedicate your life to it. But sometimes a situation sucker punches you in the jaw, and you have to hunch into the surprise of that sudden, shocking discomfort before you can move on. That’s what happened to me as that otherwise pleasant lunch unfolded, and I had to take a moment to collect my thoughts, to gather the raw feelings of anger and helplessness and turn them into fuel that might succeed at powering something worthwhile.

We’ll call my mom’s friend Susan for the sake of simplicity and anonymity, but feel quite free to think of Susan as your friend, your neighbor, your sister, your mother, or your cousin. Susan could be anyone and, in point of fact, she is far too many of us in this country.

We ordered our food and sat down in a shady spot outdoors. The weather was perfect, not sticky hot as Florida is wont to be, and not too cool either. The food was delicious and I was digging the company and the carefree time spent untethered from my computer. The conversation stayed light, with laughter interspersed throughout, but the words were heavy. At the end of the afternoon, the weight was nearly insupportable. And I wasn’t even living this life. I was only hearing about it.

Susan has a government job and has worked there for decades. She’s eligible for retirement, but can’t afford to quit working for several more years. Her kids are grown. She’s a single woman. She has health issues that her insurance doesn’t cover, leaving her in the lurch for thousands of dollars after seeking care, without which she might not have been able to continue getting to and from work. Speaking of work, that government job she’s had for more than two dozen years? Yeah, it doesn’t pay enough to cover her basic living expenses, so she works a second job on weekends and late into the evenings after working a full day at what should be a good job.

Despite all of this, Susan is upbeat and seems to enjoy life. But she deserves more. She’s worked hard her entire life. Isn’t that the key to success in this country? You work hard, you find a job that offers health benefits, and you work your way up the ladder of success. But what happens when the ladder stops abruptly only a few rungs above the ground? What happens when that much-coveted health insurance doesn’t pay for jack shit and, no matter how hard you toil, you never receive a single cost of living increase to your wages? What then?

Y’all, our system is broken when working hard for more than 25 years leaves you facing the decision to either live in poverty or take a second job in the service industry. After that much time in the workforce, you should be able to live comfortably and retire with dignity. I know that some of y’all are members of the choir to which I’m preaching, but there are so many others that don’t see this problem for what it is. They blame folks like Susan for not being good enough, hardworking enough, smart enough, etc. But what else was she supposed to do? She secured what has traditionally been considered a good job — a position in the government, complete with health insurance — and worked hard for decades. Wasn’t that supposed to be the price of the golden ticket that allows you access to the fabled American Dream? If not, what is?

People sometimes respond to my entreaties that jobs should pay a living wage and folks should have access to quality healthcare that doesn’t bankrupt them when they try to use it with: people should just get a better job if they don’t like the one they have.

Great. Yep. Awesome advice that I’m sure no one ever thought of before. And sick people should just get better, amirite? If I start rolling my eyes now, I might never stop…

We raise our kids to believe the American Dream is a real thing they can achieve one day if they stick to the path through the wilderness of adulthood. Step off the path and you might never find your way back, but if you finish high school and go to college, you can get one of those good jobs. And that’s the goal, right? A good job that pays your bills, lets you (lightly) spoil your kids and take a family vacation every summer, all the while allowing you to put away a shiny nest egg you don’t break open until the golden years of your retirement. Perfect.

But it’s also unattainable af.

I grew up thinking a college degree was some kind of skeleton key that would open a whole host of doors. Not any door, but enough of them that the sky would be the fucking limit. So, I got a college degree…in philosophy. As you can imagine, my key didn’t unlock many doors. And when I was looking to go back to work outside the home after writing and raising a child for several years, it didn’t open any doors at all. I had to go back to school for two semesters to earn a paralegal certificate that allowed me to work in a law office wrangling attorneys. But that cost money and time a lot of folks don’t have, making it a privilege, a non-option, a locked door. And, anyway, it’s bullshit. I had a college degree, and it wasn’t enough. I know folks with graduate degrees that aren’t enough.

The system is broken.

After lunch, I told my mother that this was why I did this work. Susan’s experience. My own. Millions of other people that I will never meet. Hard work should be enough to succeed in this country. No one should work for 30 years and still find themselves one paycheck away from calamity. I’m a firm believer in personal responsibility, but the system is stacked against too many of us at birth, and it hardly matters what path we take through the wilderness. Even if you do everything right, you might still find yourself unable to earn a golden ticket. No matter how many locks you try, your key only opens a small number of doors, and none of them leads to the American Dream. You’ll stay in that darkened hallway for the rest of your life, searching for light, believing that you are to blame.

That’s not okay. None of this is. I have to believe that more is possible. That we can do better in this country. That we can unlock these doors to opportunity. That we can let in the light.

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The Art of Sheltering in Place

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So, you’ve decided to shelter in place.

Looking over your massive checklist, you feel pretty damned good about your progress thus far: you’ve boarded up your windows, fully stocked your pantry with a variety of unhealthy snacks and wine, filled up your car, polished off the remaining tubs of ice cream in your freezer (you know, in case of power outages), and put together a workable plan B for evacuation if the situation takes a sudden turn for the worse.

Now you wait.

And wait.

And wait.

The distance between when the hurricane first shows up as an indistinct circular blob far out in the Atlantic and when it finally rakes across the boarded up expanse of your coastal community can be upwards of ten days. In that prolonged period of frenzied activity followed by anxiety laced nothingness, you’ve had time to watch your friends go batshit on social media as they publicly decide whether to stay or go, posting a nonstop flood of pictures depicting destruction and terror from past storms that manages to seriously harsh your mellow. You’ve fielded panicked texts, calls, and emails from out of state friends and relatives who are freaking out on your behalf as you take time away from conducting precious hurricane prep in order to soothe them. You’ve bought eighty dollars worth of the unhealthiest garbage you could find, along with several bottles or cans of your alcohol of choice. You’ve returned to the store to replenish that first round of snacks and booze because, after a few days of the storm barely moving at all, you shoveled everything you could find in the cupboards and fridge into your mouth, despite your solemn pledge not to gain ten pounds during this hurricane. You’ve watched too many hours of the Weather Channel, gasping when you see correspondents broadcasting from your nearby sleepy little expanse of beach (looking at you, Jim Cantore).

But, mostly, you’ve just been waiting, because work, school, and all your social activities have been canceled, leaving you plenty of time to imagine the worst (days without power and air conditioning in the sweltering heat), scarf down round two of your snacks (the store’s still open, anyway), and pull up Expedia.com long enough to check out a few hotels further inland before scoffing cavalierly and refusing to be dislodged from your own home (also, what clothes would you bring? You’ve already gained five pounds).

The wait is mind-numbingly boring and yet also weighty with fear of the unknown storm, which is currently spinning hundreds of miles southeast of your location. What you need is something to take your mind off of this.

Don’t you have some work you could be doing in the meantime? Oh, you’ve already done it.

Hurricane prep? Done and done days ago.

Perhaps you could visit a non-evacuated friend and commiserate over shared snacks? Well, your car is already barricaded in the garage, which is locked from the inside and lined with sandbags on the outside. Moving all that seems like way too much work.

Well, maybe you can dig into some of those round three snacks then. Technically, you’re under Hurricane Warning, which means all snacks are fair game.

The calm isn’t terrible, come to think of it. Neither is the way all your professional and social responsibilities have momentarily fallen away, leaving you oddly free, besides being trapped in the shuttered fortress of your home. And isn’t it kind of nice hearing from all the people you knew from school and all of your former coworkers who live out of state? You know, the people you never talk to in real life, just via Facebook whenever one of you posts a cute picture of your pets.

But now you’ve ventured into day seven of persistent hurricane watch, and your patience is tattering at the edges, as though it’s already weathered the howling winds and pouring rain of the incoming Category 4 (or 3? Or 2?) storm.

Can it come already? Even if it means losing power? Because you can’t do anything until it does. This phase of the game is better known as hurricane paralysis. You can watch and stuff your face, but you can’t carry on with life until the storm either puts you through the ringer or passes you by.

So you continue sheltering in place. You check in with friends. Have they evacuated? Are they staying put? Have they heard some precious tidbit about the coming storm that you somehow missed despite your white-knuckled cable news vigilance?

No one knows anything.

No one is doing anything.

Everyone is on edge, bored to tears, and eating themselves out of house and home.

Fortunately, thanks to an endless stream of updates and satellite images, you’re basically an amateur meteorologist at this point and fully capable of projecting where the hurricane (still seemingly weeks away from where you sit in front of your television, double-fisting Doritos and jarred cheese dip) will make landfall. You estimate the probability of your county falling outside of the Cone of Uncertainty with near scientific indubitability, despite your past shaky performances in high school and college level math and science courses.

This is your life now. You might as well embrace it.

Sartre once said that hell is other people. But maybe it’s actually hurricane paralysis.

In the meantime, thank god for snacks and air conditioning. Long may they last.

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Women: We’re (Not) Frauds with a Capital F

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There’s a kind of Orwellian doublespeak that festers in the dark, hidden crevices inside a woman’s head, a persistent message that underscores everything she does, from girlhood to her elder years. This doublespeak creates a situation in which she finds herself living in two separate realities that should be mutually exclusive but, somehow, coexist like host and parasite. In one reality, she’s wholly able to acknowledge that she’s intelligent, capable, innovative, thoughtful, a good parent, a good daughter, and an overall delightful human being. Yet, because of the existence of that other reality, she’s plagued with doubts about her abilities, her intelligence, her goodness, and is certain that, eventually, everyone will see her for what she is: an absolute fraud.

On the whole, I’ve done moderately well throughout my life. Good grades in school that earned a full scholarship to college, where I also performed well. Decent jobs where I received promotions and regularly took on additional responsibilities, including training coworkers and overseeing large projects. A bright daughter on whom I doted. My present career where, for the first time in my life, I find myself doing work that I actually enjoy a great deal.

And, yet, those pesky ink-black doubts persist…

Not that this is anything new. I’ve always felt less than sure about my footing, even when the more logical part of my brain tells me I’m standing in just the right place, sometimes even the best place. And these feelings of inadequacy don’t stem from a parent who was critical to the point of cruelty. Or sustained bullying in school. Or an ex who chipped away at my self-confidence until only a shivering skeleton of the person I had been remained. Overt outside judgment has very little to do with the blossoming of this doubt. Funnily enough, if anything, the external feedback I’ve received over my lifetime has been consistently positive, which only seems to make things worse, deepening the rising dread that I’ll eventually be found out, exposed, and then what?

This brand of trouble starts and ends inside my own head, where that opposite-facing commentary runs along doggedly for however long I’m awake, the criticisms and self reflection cripplingly intense. I am a master at taking my own inventory, at receiving compliments and finding a way to twist them into criticisms, at wondering just how long it will be before someone figures out my long game and exposes me for exactly what I am.

A fraud.

If only you could be seen for what you really are, that nasty bitch snarls from the comfy nest she’s built inside the shadowy, inaccessible area near the back of my skull. People wouldn’t be so quick with the compliments, now would they?

Before I can respond, that howling dread metastasizes, and the bitch continues, throwing poison tipped knives that hit extremely close to home.

Not a good enough mother: your daughter was the last one waiting at pickup, WTAF?

Not smart enough to pursue this particular degree: you might be doing fine in class, for now, but how many times did it take you to read through this analysis before you finally understood it?

Not working hard enough to deserve this promotion: there’s no way in hell you’ll be able to handle all of this extra responsibility. Good luck getting fired!

Not a decent human being in any way, shape, or form: good god, if ANYONE could tap into some of the commentary running through your head, you’d be ostracized, blacklisted, and held up as a cautionary tale for impressionable children.

Here’s the thing: fuck that bitch.

I’m far from perfect, but I know I’m not a fraud. I’m damned smart (and modest, can’t you tell?). I work hard, and that’s really the key to all of my successes, large, small, and in between. If a situation needs some elbow grease, I just so happen to carry an extra large can of WD40 in my purse and I’m prepared to grease away. I gauran-damned-tee you won’t outwork me, and I’m fan-fucking-tastically quick on my feet. Put me in a corner, and I’ll come up with a way out of it. Give me a problem to solve, a tight deadline, an impenetrable text that needs deciphering. I. Am. Here. For. It.

So, why the persistent black cloud of doubt traveling over my head, ready to spill rain on every single one of my flashy parades? Why do I listen to the nasty bitch in my head? Why does she wield so much power?

Welp, little girls are born into a society that values them less than it values little boys, that teaches them to keep their options narrowed so they’re still well within range of the realm of home and family, that informs them they just aren’t great at things like math, science, leadership, sports, and the like. Those little girls eat up all that garbage, and that just so happens to be the kind of cuisine that best feeds the nasty bitch setting up shop inside their heads, infecting their every move with doubt.

Are you sure you should tell everyone your opinion? What if you’re wrong?

No one will like you if you run for Student Body President. Leave that to one of the boys.

Awfully bossy and full of yourself, aren’t you?

College, sure, but this degree will put you waaaaaaay out of your depth, sweetheart.

And on, and on, and on, the bullshit piling up as the years proceed.

Even in these more ‘enlightened’ times, the inequities persist, and we internalize the hell out of them, ladies.

I’ve watched men to which the label of ‘mediocre’ would be an overstatement of their actual abilities conduct themselves with rock solid confidence as they bumble through life, pulling a reverse King Midas as they turn all they touch into complete shit. These men are routinely rewarded by society and called leaders. They certainly receive higher salaries than the more accomplished and better prepared women around them.

The game is unfair, the playing field far from level, the rules rigged in favor of anything masculine, deck upon deck stacked against us. So, what’s a woman to do?

Glad you asked.

First order of business: punch that nasty bitch in the throat whenever she dares to whisper those untruths at inopportune moments. You don’t need that shit. She’ll STFU if you hit her often enough. It’s gonna take time, though, so don’t give up after the first thousand hits.

Second order of business: ask yourself WWMWMD?

What would mediocre white man do?

It’s a valid question, because these are the fellas who can best skate through life by virtue of their sex and skin color, gliding over paths made just for them, usually on the backs of people of color and women. These are the guys who breeze in late, interrupting your presentation to ask a question you already covered in the beginning. When you make a suggestion, no one hears it, but when MWM repeats what you just said, everyone claps him on the back for his originality and ability to problem solve. Also, he’s your boss! Or, he answers to you yet makes more than you do. MWM never worries about reading the assignment before monopolizing the conversation during the philosophical seminar. Waiting one’s turn is for other, less white, less male rule-following suckers. He has things to say! He’s the fella who takes all the credit for the preparation and sweat equity you put into the project to make sure it’s a success. Only 20% qualified for the position? MWM will apply for it anyway and actually get the job! Meanwhile, you’re taking online leadership courses, learning the second language the position suggested applicants know, and not lying on your resume…oh, you’re also seething with soul-destroying rage at this guy’s audacity, as well as his consistent, inexplicable success despite obvious incompetence.

You aren’t going to beat the mediocre white men rocketing through life on hopes, prayers, and a kickass combination of white male privilege — this is his game, after all. But you can join him by asking yourself: WWMWMD?

He wouldn’t let doubts keep him from reaching for stars he has no business even craning his neck to stare at. He leaps first, looks later, or not at all. Not qualified for the job? Who the fuck cares? That’s what learning while doing is for. Or, better, delegating it to a lower level employee and then taking the credit. I don’t suggest being an asshole to reach your goals, but do try on some of that mediocre white male confidence for yourself. It feels pretty damned good. And after walking around encased in it for a while, you’ll find yourself making it much more than you’re faking it.

This was a lesson I finally learned the hard way last year, surrounded by men who should have known better than I did based on length of experience but didn’t actually appear to. It suddenly dawned on me: I can do this better than they can, yet I’m letting the nasty bitch inside my head hold me back. I’m competent, hardworking, intelligent, and tired of putting up with this absolute shitshow. Thus, WWMWMD? was born.

Go ahead, ladies, drape yourself in that unearned, audaciously scintillating confidence, and stride into any situation life presents as though you own the place. You might feel like a sheep among wolves at first. But I guarantee you that wearing that rich, warm coat of stolen fur will quickly turn you into a wolf yourself. And then? Sky’s the limit.

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