Career Women

Yesterday was one of those hellacious days at work where I went cross-eyed from the computer glare, had a headache that could only be cured by copious amounts of wine, and all I wanted to do was put my head on the desk in front of me and nap. Days like yesterday make me really begin to envy all those trophy wives that don't work and spend their days getting facials and driving in their luxury SUV's. You know the gals I'm talking about...while you're running around on your lunch break trying to fit in the actual eating of food with a million other errands, they pull up beside you looking calm, cool, and collected in an SUV that usually sports leather seats, an iPod that Apple still makes, and obviously a really good makeup artist because your five minutes in the bathroom trying to put some paint on the old barn doesn't even begin to compete with their perfectly applied lip liner, baby.

Everytime this happens to me and one of the trophy wives pull up beside me, I look at the reflection of myself in the rearview and just say a prayer that nobody in Wal-Mart or Target notices the straggly gray hair staring pointedly at me because I haven't had the time or money to go get my hair did. Or the fact that the five minutes allotted for morning makeup application was vetoed this particular morning (and, truth be told, pretty much every morning) in favor of extra sleep. Thankfully, Wal-Mart seems to be much more forgiving of a less put together look. Target, not so much.

The life of a career woman - how different it is in real life as compared to, say, Anne Hathaway's character in "The Devil Wears Prada." Yeah the responsibilites are real and the people in charge can be really scary, but instead of looking fabulous all the time and reaping rewards like clothing from The Closet at Vogue, you are trying to pay a mortgage and credit cards charged up on a whim and make sure the dog hair didn't get on your pants that most definitely didn't come from the Calvin Klein showroom. I can't imagine doing this and trying to raise kids, too. Hats off to my mama, who was a career woman in heels every single day of my childhood and even on into my early adulthood. And she had to deal with '80's shoulder pads and spiky pumps. At least now shoulder pads are left to history or people on "What Not To Wear" and a girl can wear some awesome ballet flats and still be considered in style.

To all my fellow career women out there...keep your chin up because I know y'all too have had days like the one I had yesterday. In our own small ways, in our own industries, in our own companies, we are doin' our thing and making our own way.

In ballet flats, of course.