In 1989, I was still spending time playing someone else’s game. As ill-luck would have it, I was the junior lawyer (and the only liberal or female) on a five-member crackerjack legal team working on a mind-numbing, decade-long Superfund case involving groundwater contaminated by rocket fuel. I was rehearsing for a stage revue in my parallel life at the same time and I was struggling to hide it from the other legal team members, as sometimes this meant ducking out of the law firm early (7 p.m.!) to get to rehearsal. Leaving early was not regarded as a smart career move for a baby lawyer, but I so hated that case.
That musical revue was the only thing I looked forward to all day. One night, as I was arranging my suit jacket on my chair at 7 p.m. to make it look like I was still in my office, I was ‘caught’ leaving by one of the high and mighty, mid-level, oh-so-smug, puffed-up lawyers who had been torturing me with make-work assignments on that case for months just to watch me squirm. Karl asked me where I was going and genuinely seemed interested in the show. He asked me what role I had. I told him I was the third singing string bean from the left in Act I and one of five French can-can dancing girls in Act III. He burst out laughing. He was singularly unimpressed with the minor nature of these roles, wanted to know what I did during Act II and demanded to know, most importantly, whether there were skimpy costumes involved. There were, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. He would have dragged the whole law firm there to laugh at me.
Being, I suppose, flip, I told him that I usually spent the time during Act II reflecting on how sometimes in life, we just have to stop and think about the different roles we play and how, sometimes, you get to be a string bean, sometimes a can-can girl, and that the tricky part is allowing yourself enough time in between to make the costume change. He did not get that at all. Of course, he did not get me at all.
I left his team and that law firm not long after. I felt like I could breathe again.
Twenty years later, I still think there is a lot of truth in it: sometimes in life, it comes down to playing different roles and stopping to reflect on being a string bean or a can-can girl and how to make that transformation smooth. The tricky part is allowing yourself enough time in between to make that big leap. And to make sure you don’t leave any pieces of your costume behind when you step out on stage.
~ Catherine E. Cutler
