I arrived on Day One, in Item One of my totally new executive wardrobe. Anyone want to buy a very groovy flowing jacket, perfect for summer days in the subtropics? I have two that I purchased specially for that job (from my friend, Jill, an importer — into South Africa — of glam things from India) sitting in my wardrobe here in California. One is the brightest cherry red and the other is khaki. You wouldn’t know they’d been worn, because they seldom were.
Back to Day One: My bubbling enthusiasm is tempered only by a small whisper of trepidation. Will I rise to the occasion?
Will I live up to the expectations of this person who wouldn’t take no for an answer when I said, No, I could not meet him for lunch because I was writing a novel and had a schedule mapped out.
Three-hour into a “come on, just a quickie sandwich” meeting, I was on board. I was planning my Cosmo replacement and my resignation letter and feeling luck shining down upon me. They wanted me.
They wanted to give me an executive title and an open brief. They had a staff awaiting my guidance. They were going to give me a new company car. And the salary? I don’t recall the figure, but I know it was good and that there were perks.
He said they’d chosen me for my “perceived image” and “superior writing skills.” (And didn’t flattery got them everywhere? Because, yes, I had a poor self-image and felt — and haven’t I subsequently coached so many women and a couple of men who feel exactly like this? — that while I might have been writing intelligent stories and getting credit for them, and while I might have notched up two university degrees, at anytime, someone would find out my real abilities and I’d be outed as a fraud.)
So, there were many good reasons to feel lucky. And excited. And enthused.
Especially because there was a cherry on the top of all of this.
We were going to save the world. Or at least, South Africa, which was our world.
I would be working as Director of Communications for the Peace Foundation. The organization he was with, which I knew as the Indaba Foundation, had, he said, changed direction and was reinventing itself.
© W.H.
