Ain\'t no party like a GDAD party!!

Hey! Glad you can make it!  C’mon in, the inequity’s fine!  We have your full spread of vices over on the buffet table.  No soul has been spared.  Kindly leave your virtue with any one of our lovely hostesses.  What happens here stays here…  I can’t recall the biblical quote that cautions against putting your faith in anything but God.  The fact that I could still acknowledge the existence of such a quote in such a book after Friday afternoon’s festivities is comfort enough that my Savior is still with me.  You can’t help but want to believe in certain people in your lives.  After a period of time, haven’t they earned that faith and trust?  This afternoon, just mere hours after posting about life’s improvement at the Biotech, my office became ringside to a marital and professional betrayal.    Managing daily disasters is pretty much the unspoken job description here.  We’ve all learned to only minimally plan our day, fully aware that a last-minute event will, in all probability, upset those plans.  It was in this vein that I agreed to cover the call center phones while the coordinating manager ran home to attend to some family business.  I butted heads with Alice a few times.  Mostly business stuff, but I think she came to realize that I respected her expertise and work ethic.  She started her days before me and ended a few of them after me.  She was sharp, and knew the Biotech better than anyone on staff.  She was also quick to tell you what she knew.  Like I said, we butted heads a few times.  George came from corporate back east.  He showed up last November after the Biotech realized they were paying for an operations manager that had not existed for the previous five months.  It was going to only last until the New Year, then he would retire to his Bat Cave and continue his vigil of Gotham.  By January, we had our new ops manager, and I liked him almost immediately.  Idealistic, awash in that obnoxious British, can-do, we’ll-muddle-through-old-chap, happy crap.  Well, give the guy credit, he got it done, and against some long odds.  I told him as much just a few weeks ago.  George stayed on afterwards, because by then our disaster of a project manager was summarily fired for offenses still undisclosed.  I butted heads with George once or twice, too.  As with Alice, however, I came to respect his skill sets and even his bloviating.  George threw himself into the asylum and commanded the attention of all the inmates, which allowed us to finally do our jobs.  George and Alice worked closely together, as he needed a confidant that kept tabs on the place during his absences.  I felt for the guy.  Having to travel across three time zones to spend weeks apart from his family would have to be a grind, to say the least.  He seemed to have a handle on it, but it was more than I’d be willing to do.  At about 3:30 in the afternoon, one of our techs was leaving for the day and we were wishing each other a fine weekend when the helpline rang in.  I answered.  “I’m Alice’s husband and I’m looking for George.”  Oh  Crap  What ensued was the most harrowing five-minute phone call of my professional life.  Alice always spoke well of her husband, and her kids, for that matter.  The daughter was working through college, and we all got coffee last Christmas, courtesy of the job she was holding down in San Francisco.  Very few people at work know of my situation, and Alice’s family seemed to exemplify the kind of life I might have had if only…  So here I was, listening to a marriage break up.  His tone.  His words.  They were my emotions from last October.  I listened and prayed for God to take me from this.  George and Alice.  Having an affair.    I spoke to him.  I told him about my own situation.  The circumstances are different, but yes, I walked in those shoes.  I gave him my number and encouraged him to talk to friends and keep himself occupied.    You never say the right things in those moments.  The right words always come hours later.  The human condition can be a cruel joke in those moments.  Damn.  He said he was bringing Alice over and would confront the management of the Biotech.  He was bringing a sexual harassment suit against George and my company, with whom the Biotech was contracted.  He has a very good case, to be honest.  Our ops manager has been taking a well-deserved vacation this week.  He gets in Monday.  I do not know how much he knows.  I will meet him early on Monday morning to find out.  I put the odds at even money that we could all be out of a job before the day is out.    At minimum, we just lost two key employees.  That pales in comparison to what Alice and her family have just lost.  I just hope George has the good sense to have disappeared by now.  It’s been decades since I’ve held a violent thought,  I’m having one now.  I hate myself for it, and God help me, I love it too.    A glimmer of hope:  The X2B regaled me about her day with Li’l GUN and the tall ships.  It was the most normal family moment I’ve had in months.  I drank it in like a  wanderer from the desert.  Her words.  Her tone.  My God, are we really divorcing?    Well, of course, we are.  For that moment, though, I was allowed to pretend otherwise.  I listened, I nodded.  I almost told her about my day, but no.  This was God reminding me that there would be a life after our divorce.  This was His gift to me in my moment of despair.  He is with me now.  He’ll be with me after Monday, and beyond.  I hope I can remember that, if I see George.