DLand - The Glass Closet

This evening we had a dinner meeting to discuss the employee handbook. My company is *very* small (six full time employees) and we have been lacking in some written policies for a while. There were lots of boring paragraphs about confidentiality and intellectual properties and comp time (or its abolishment - yeah!). Tucked away towards the end amongst all the mumbo jumbo was this policy statement: It is the policy of [Our Tiny Software Co] to prohibit discrimination against employees or job applicants based on their race, color, religion, national origin, political affiliation, disability, sex or age. This Equal Employment Opportunity policy was developed to protect you from unfair treatment relating to any of the above facts and applies to recruitment, hiring, training, promotions, transfers, and all other personnel actions taken by [Our Tiny Software Co].

Notice what's missing? Most people don't. I thought maybe I read it wrong. But there it was in black and white. Nowhere did it say anything about sexual orientation. The next paragraph talked about violations of the law (versus our policy). At lunch with Bossman, I asked if they were two different things and Bossman basically said yeah, meaning they were different but nobody reads it anyways and all this wording came from the lawyer's office.

Hmm. For a few hours, I didn't want to bring it up. I thought they would think I was being nit-picky. I thought they would make some dorky comment about it that would embarrass me. But driving to dinner, I realized that if it wasn't important, I wouldn't be obsessing over it. I decided it was crucial.

So at our dinner meeting I told Dan (our fella writing up this handbook) I would like sexual orientation added to the company policy.

Dan: "It's not part of the law. We can't add it."

Me: "But you just said that the first paragraph is our policy and the second paragraph is the law. They're even labelled as such. I know you can't change the law, I just want it in our policy."

Pause from Dan. Dan takes handbook and reads paragraphs again.

Dan: "Well, if we add that who can we discriminate against? Geez!" (always a joker)

Me: "I would like it in the policy ... unless someone objects."

Dan: "Ok, I'll add it."

Score one for me! It may sound silly, but it's important. Just because all the employees (besides me) are upper middle class married white guys, we can't ignore it. It may not seem important if you're not in that group. But unless you can come up with a good reason for discriminating against sexual orientation in a software development company (which is what you're doing by refusing to put it in the handbook when asked), I want it in my handbook. So there. If you don't plan on discriminating against it, then why would you object to putting it in the book?

I know that it was an oversight and ignorance rather than any homophobic malice on any of my coworkers' parts. But it became more and more important to me the more I thought about it. Even the fact that it would be in the policy paragraph and not the violation paragraph would be even more of a point made. The handbook would then say something about how we operate as a company instead of just which federal holidays we get to accrue.

I can't change the laws of our state (it *is* Virginia after all - home of Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson). I can, however, have a voice in the policies of my company. For some reason, those two words added to my handbook make me feel like my company cares just a little more about me. I know I get props from Bossman and get satisfaction from my career. But sometimes it's nice to see it in writing.

One foot out of the glass closet.

DLand - There Are Three Things ...

Jeremy reported to me this evening that he doesn't think our new neighbor is very smart. Me: "Why?"

Jer: "He's smoking a cigarette and trying to pour gas into a gas can about a foot from his face."

In retrospect, I probably should have run out there and tried to knock some sense into him before he set his face and his entire front lawn on fire. But at the time it just seemed too strange to believe. It's a shame, too, because he seemed like such a nice young man. My mother says that people with nice neighbors take them for granted.

This evening's project has been the new ice cream maker. Ms. Bea gave it to me the other day when I was at her house. She claims she will never use it, despite ice cream being one of her favorite things. I told her that I would test drive it for her and then return it so we could try it out together. The french vanilla is churning away next to me on the kitchen table.

My father is so smart sometimes. One of the things he says is:

"There are three things in life that you will never understand fully unless you experience them first hand - sex, war and depression."

My existance, and the pictures of him in Vietnam are proof enough of the first two. But he says that until he lost his job (7 years ago he was laid off), he would have never understood true depression that others go through. It was a hard time for the whole family (I was away at college) but he made it through and eventually got his job back.

Ms. Bea is going through a hard time now. It's so strange with Daddy Byron being gone. The house is very empty now. But she's very depressed. She won't go outside at night by herself (even to put the blind dog in the back yard to "do his business"), she won't shower unless someone else is in the house, and she cries all the time. I'm certain she'll come out of it, but it's just going to take a while. And all of us are trying to be as supportive as possible.

It's kind of ironic to see how lonely she is after being trapped in the house with her husband for so many years (she doesn't drive and he couldn't after his lungs started to get the better of him). They seemed to be constantly fussing at each other (like siblings stuck in a back seat together for too long). And now the house just seems so quiet.

I can only begin to imagine. I must admit I absolutely hate being alone. I have never ever lived alone. And I don't plan on it for at least another 50 years or so if ever. I just get all morose. Pets help. But they only provide but so much companionship after a while. Sure, the occasional weekend is nice when Sweetpea has somewhere else to be. But overall, I'm a people person (despite all my cynical griping about people being stupid). Perhaps it's why Sweetpea and I were attracted to each other.

So I'm working on appreciating the people around me more. Bossman told me I was being really bitchy this morning (I was a real sour grape - just woke up grumpy). I'm glad that I have such a cool boss to tell me when I'm being a weiner instead of suffering through it. So I tried really hard to perk up and have succeeded overall today. I'm gonna go finish my ice cream (with dark chocolate chunks if I'm inspired) and apologize to Sweetpea for fussing at him about the dog's collar earlier. Mad love to you all.

DLand - MRR! MRRR! MRR!

What a good weekend this was. Didn't do anything too stressful or exciting. Just had a really good time hanging out with Jerome and Tina. Jerome's truck is fabulous. It seats five. I'm all about wanting one. Today's funny story comes courtesy of my new found friend, Tina. Apparently, Tina and her daughter would stay up late at night and watch cheesy, scary movies like Chucky or Slumber Party Massacre. Well, one night they watched their scary movie and then went to bed. Later, Tina's daughter and her friend burst into Tina's room squealing and wailing about some Boogie Man in their room.

The girls: Eek, there's some man in our room! He keeps moaning! Let us sleep with you!

Tina: No way! Go back to bed - there's nobody in your room. Get a grip.

The girls: No! We can hear him! He keeps saying, "mrrr mrerorror. mrermrmu mrrrror"

Tina: What?

The girls: "mrrr mrerorror. mrermrmu mrrrror" We can hear him!

Somehow, they finally manage to fall back asleep later that night.

The next morning Tina's daughter found the "Boogie Man". It was a stuffed Eeyore doll that talked. Apparently he was under a pile of blankets and one of girls had rolled on him. So the Boogie Man was saying "I'm Eeyore. Have a happy day" in typical Eeyore fashion. The girls chased each other around the house all day yelling "He's gonna get you" and squeezing him so he'd say things like "Didn't think you would notice me."