He knows exactly what he's doing

Sometimes, when I’m feeling generous, I think guys don’t realize the thousands of annoying or downright toxic, sexist things they do every day. Sometimes (like at about 8pm on a Thursday) I think that they know exactly what they’re doing.

Seriously, a guy pinged me today on IM to ask me about some test cases, and said, “have a great day.” Which was nice enough. Then he added “keep on smiling that great smile.” It’s a good thing he was about 9500 miles away because I would have gladly smacked him. But that’s an obvious example. Too easy. The every day shit is usually a lot more subtle.

He’s the guy who’s your junior offering to help you with a task while implying that he could do it better.

He’s the colleague who asks you insanely detailed questions in a meeting just to try to trip you up in public.

He’s the manager who says things like “I know you’re new to this role” when you have in fact trained hundreds of people to do this job.

He’s the team mate who’s never rude to you but never responds to your inquiries while replying instantly to your male colleague.

He’s the guy who constantly interrupts you in meetings until you have to be quite publicly rude to make yourself heard.

He’s the guy who gets in your space in the office, pushing his stuff onto your desk, standing too close in the hallway, putting his cell phone and coffee next to your computer in the meeting.

He’s the manager who always hires women of one particular type.

He’s the stakeholder who, even though you have successfully managed dozens of big projects, refuses to believe that you can manage this one.

They’re the guys who, during the break, all huddle together to talk earnestly and importantly, away from the women in the group.

When you read another article bemoaning the lack of women in tech, realize that after years of dealing with the constant negativity of sexism, women just get sick of it. Literally sick. Not just frustrated, but waking up in the morning nauseated with stress and dreading another day doing the work that they once loved.

We’re good at what we do. Woman-led projects are less likely to be abandoned, more likely to be completed on time, on budget, and meeting or exceeding expectations. Woman-built code is more likely to be accepted by customers. Woman bosses are preferred by employees and have higher levels of employee engagement.

This in spite of the constant barrage of disrespect.

I have yet to work for a company that had any kind of training to address sexism in the workplace.

Do better.

The city by the bay

I was in a reminiscing sort of mood today, and telling one of my tales to my kids got me to thinking about San Francisco. I lived there for one short year in the 1980s.

It was different then. Real fog horns. Punk rock. Bedraggled vestiges of a psychedelic past. People obviously dying of AIDS like walking skeletons on the streets. And Presidio was still a military base – that’s where I was stationed.

It’s a long story. In basic training, I and a few other young women bound for the Defense Language Institute formed friendships and hung out together. But the personnel clerks just couldn’t believe that we were supposed to go to language school straight out of basic, so they changed our orders and sent us to AIT at Goodfellow AFB instead. We TOLD them they were wrong, but what does a dumb private know? So we graduated and got on a plane to Texas. At Goodfellow they took one look at our orders and said “what the hell are you doing here?” and took us back to the airport, bound for Monterey.

I don’t remember much of Monterey. I was there long enough to buy a pink bikini, get slightly drunk,  dance my ass off at the NCO club, go see the Rocky Horror Picture Show, play tonsil hockey with a complete stranger, and narrowly avoid arrest. The next day, the army stuck me and two of my pals on a Greyhound bus to San Francisco, where an overflow branch of the language school taught German and Korean classes.

Lori and Killer and I arrived at the bus station in downtown San Francisco in the middle of the night. It was…gritty. But hey, when you’re travelling with a woman named Killer, you fear nothing. We grabbed a taxi. On the edge of the Presidio, far away from the rest of the base, was an old hospital building that had been casually converted to a language school. When we arrived in the big, ugly lobby and dragged our luggage to the CQ desk, a perky young man popped out of one of the chairs.

“Hi girls! I’m Bob,” he announced. Turns out sitting up half the night, watching TV and greeting all the newcomers, was his odd habit. He cheerfully showed us up to our rooms after the CQ gave us our keys. I think he was hoping to meet a girlfriend this way. It never worked.

Ever slept in a hospital? Imagine living in one. The wide hallways with plain white floors. Exam rooms still equipped with cabinets, sinks, and black countertops converted to bedrooms. My first room was actually a former supply/medicine closet. There was still a morgue in the building. I’ll always wonder if that’s where the commander’s office was. I hope so.

But the city! The long trek to the Geary street bus stop, past stylish homes, flower stands, the bodega on the corner where I’d buy a yogurt and a Martinelli’s because the chow hall food was awful. Bicycling up and down the hills, trying to beat the bus downtown. The crumbling old movie theaters with their tattered velvet and dusty chandeliers, showing cult film double features for a dollar. The dive bar where I slam danced while Black Flag played, until Killer tapped me on the shoulder and said “We have to leave. I’m allergic to marijuana.” Starting at the base of the Golden Gate Bridge to run my PT test along the beach. Dodging pigeons on my bicycle to go hang out at Ghirardelli square, watching street performers, or grabbing a bread bowl of clam chowder on the wharf. The green trees wreathed in cold fog outside my window, with the haunting sound of the fog horns ever present. Sitting on a rock at Ocean Beach, watching the seals and the spray. And always, always the smell of the ocean.

But what I remember most about my time in San Francisco was freedom. I’d left a dysfunctional family and a controlling boyfriend to join the army. For the first time in my life I was my own woman. It’s hard to imagine army life feeling like freedom, but outside of the classroom and the PT formation, I could go where I pleased, do as I pleased, love (or not) whom I pleased, wear what I pleased. I was 19 years old, at the top of my class, ridiculously fit, and all out of fucks to give.

Years later, I went back to San Francisco for a work project. At a big white marble bank. In the financial district. Everything had changed. I walked the streets after work and ate alone in little pubs and bistros and climbed Telegraph hill looking for the parrots. But nothing was the same. Certainly not me. Because every day missing my daughters was a hollow ache, and every night falling asleep in my swank hotel, I longed for the open window of my barracks room and the long-silenced sound of fog horns. I don’t want to go back again.