Chapter 16
16
PHIL COLLINS AND THE GREAT TESCO MELTDOWN
Bleary-eyed and as grumpy as a toddler who’s got past nap time, I’m sitting on the sofa working on a really exciting article on ten ways to increase productivity in the workplace. It’s going about as well as writing the letter to my younger self went last night. What I want to write is ‘pay your staff more and stop ripping the arse clean out of them with extra demands’, but I don’t think that would fly with this particular client – or any particular client to be honest.
Instead, I’m trying to sell some sort of grown-up version of a reward chart complete with corporate wank-speak, which doesn’t so much as verge on condescending as have its own address on Condescension Street. Today’s client offers ￡10 meal vouchers, branded company merch and 25 per cent discount on their software as incentives, which can be won by their extremely hard-working and undervalued staff. It’s my job to make that, frankly insulting, attempt at employee motivation sound ground-breaking and aspirational.
This is not as easy as it sounds and I’m aware it doesn’t sound easy at all.
‘What do you think, Daniel? How would you recommend we promote a culture of positivity and productivity in the modern workforce?’
Daniel raises one furry eyebrow, yawns and rolls over, releasing a profoundly unpleasant dog fart in the process.
‘You’re a great help,’ I scold, before giving him a gentle pet and telling him that he is a very good boy and the best dog in the whole wide world. He responds by rolling onto his back and exposing his tummy to demand belly rubs.
‘If only I could write that offering tummy rubs and being willing to live with noxious emissions could motivate all staff,’ I tell him, before a flash of inspiration strikes me. What if I use this template – the boring old ‘Ten Ways to…’ that seems to make up the staple of my B2B work – to draft up a proposal for Northern People magazine? I’d flesh it out, obviously, beyond a bullet-pointed list so that I could inject humour and heart and realism into it, but it might work?
‘Ten Ways to Survive Your Forties’, for example? It might just work. In fact, I think it really could and I want to start writing it now, but I have to meet my deadline and then I have to check on Mum. It’s still bitterly cold and icy outside and I don’t want any repeats of yesterday’s shenanigans. But later… later I can lose myself in writing something that makes my heart sing. I just need to focus on this list first. It’s what young me would’ve done. She always was very studious and sensible after all.
Fifteen minutes later, I’m down to number six – ‘give positive feedback’ – when my phone buzzes to life with a notification that I’ve been added to a new group chat on WhatsApp called, rather unimaginatively, ‘Becks, Laurs and Niamh’. Seconds later my phone buzzes again, with the first message to the group – from Laura.
Laura
I read my letter.
Niamh
Are we sticking to what is written in the letter is between the letter writer and her God rule, or are we allowed to ask for the deets?
Niamh
Because I’m supervising in the sixth-form centre just now so it would be a good time to get caught up in a WhatsApp chat.
Me
I think it’s up to the letter writer to decide whether or not to share.
Laura
I think I might need to share. But I think I might need wine, or vodka, or something.
Me
That bad?
Laura replies with five crying face emojis.
Niamh
Oh shit, I’m sorry, love. I’d pop over with a bottle and a box of tissues but sadly the principal tends to frown on that kind of behaviour.
Me
And I’m in B2B hell. But I’m here for you. Honest. Do we need to schedule some sort of crisis meeting about this?
There’s a long pause where I can see that Laura has read my reply, as has Niamh, but neither of them have responded and I’m starting to worry I’m about to die from the worst possible humiliation of modern times – being left on read. But then my screen lights up with ‘Laura is typing’ and I wait with bated breath.
Laura
Can we? I know I’ve no right to ask after everything but no one is going to understand this like you two will. I tried talking to Aidan about it but he doesn’t get it. He said I was only a child when I wrote it and I can’t hold younger me to the same standards as grown-up me but
There’s a pause and then the same ‘Laura is typing’ message pops up again.
Laura
I think younger me had higher standards than grown-up me and I don’t know what the actual fuck I’m doing with my life.
Niamh
Just tell me where and when I need to be. My house is obviously not suitable because teenage boys are feral.
Me
My house is always free. If you don’t mind the dog, who smells about as bad as a teenage boy in fairness but I can light a Yankee Candle.
Laura
Tonight then? Even teatime? I’ll bring chippy chips. Chippy chips make everything better.
Me
It’s a deal. I have white bread, real butter and red sauce here so we can make chip butties.
Laura
Perfect. Thanks girls. I’ll see you then.
Niamh
Hang in there, kid. We’ve got your back.
My phone falls silent and I resume my article, wondering if it would go down well if I wrote ‘give your employees chippy chips, as this makes everything better’. This job would be so much easier if I could just cut through the bullshit and get directly to the heart of the matter. I bet more people would read chip-related advice than some nonsense about encouraging an atmosphere of flexibility and dedication to the customer base, which actually translates as sucking up worsening working conditions.
Maybe I’ll add the chip-related advice to my ‘Ten Ways to Survive Your Forties’ pitch.
‘Make sure to eat chippy chips, or pizza, or ice cream on a semi-regular basis. It won’t kill you and it will make you feel like you’re treating yourself. Diet advice is all well and good, but resist the urge to suck all the food-related joy out of life. Yes, a beautiful, from-scratch, low carb, high protein plant-based dinner can be tasty and can have health benefits but it’s not a chip butty, is it? Sometimes you need to bring out the big guns.’
Or something like that.
Daniel lets out a low rumbling growl. I imagine he’s telling me to quit dreaming about chips and just get on with my actual work and not my long-shot of a magazine pitch. Those tasty chicken chews he loves so much aren’t going to pay for themselves, after all.
‘Okay,’ I tell him. ‘I’ll do it!’
He gives a half-hearted wag of his tail, which I read as ‘Finally! A good decision!’ before I focus back on the task at hand and he gives in to his sixth nap of the day.
But as much as I try to focus on my work, I can’t help but think about Laura, and what it was in her letter that might have upset her so much. She’s probably just having the same crisis of confidence that I am. With added grief, of course. I remember those raw early days only too well. They were a fever dream where I felt as if I’d had the very skin flayed from my body. Everything hurt. Every single thing felt like a personal attack. The chill in the air. The brightness of the sun. The songs that played on the radio. They didn’t even have to be sad songs – in the thick of grief everything becomes sad and is assigned more meaning. Everything serves as a reminder of what has been lost. I bawled in Tesco when ‘You Can’t Hurry Love’ by Phil Collins started playing because someone once told me my father looked like Phil Collins. He absolutely did not, for the record. I think that someone was talking about another person entirely. He certainly wasn’t talking about my father who had been a tall, thin man with glasses, a thick grey beard, and zero drumming ability. But in Tesco, on that particular day, the rawness of my loss had me bent double.
I’d left my shopping in the trolley in the middle of the aisle and hurried to my car where I’d promptly had a panic attack. Saul and Adam got to order a pizza for tea that night and were delighted with themselves, while I’d done my best to keep the strength of my grief from them. The last thing they needed was to see me to lose my emotional shit on a regular basis. No, it seems I was saving that particular treat for when perimenopause kicked in.
I must make sure that Laura knows she doesn’t have to keep any of her pain to herself. It’s a shite truth that the only way to learn how to co-exist with grief is to allow yourself to live in it fully, feeling every awful shard as it comes. Just as you can’t hurry love, you also can’t hurry grief.
I bet you sang that last bit.