A Day in the Life

Sometimes I do rather embarrassing things. Actually, I often do embarrassing things. I regularly spill my drink at dinner, or spill red wine on a friend’s couch, or say stupid things that I instantly regret. But, occasionally I do something so spectacularly humiliating that I think to myself “this can’t be real, things like this only happen in movies… right?” This is a story that many of my friends have heard, but on that off chance that you haven’t, I will share it. This is the stuff that movies are made of… I swear.

One of my good friends has a brother-in-law who happens to work in politics (let’s call him Mr. R). This friend was sweet enough to set me up with an interview, and to even talk me up a little. It’s also worth mentioning that this was the first real job interview of my adult life. I put on my brand new suit for the first time ever – a very classy black skirt ensemble from Banana Republic, took my nicest purse, and grabbed my planner (just in case I got offered a job on the spot and needed to inform my interviewer of the soonest possible date I could begin working). When I arrived I found that the interview was a little more casual than I had expected, but overall I thought the whole thing went pretty well.

One other little detail: Mr. R. had half a day off work and had been planning to take his dog to the vet. Because of his vet’s location, he decided to just bring his dog to work with him that day.

At the end of the interview Mr. R. kindly offered to walk me out to my car since he was on the way out as well (with his dog), but on the way down the stairs his dog got excited and ready to get out to the car. The dog jogged on down the stairs ahead of us, and unfortunately, I just wasn’t prepared for that. Trying to shorten my steps and avoid stepping on the dog, and wearing very high-heels (of which I was immensely proud), I just couldn’t quite keep my balance. By the time I reached the bottom of the stairs I was bent completely double, about 30 seconds away from falling head-over-heels down the stairs. Luckily for me the stairs opened up in to a wide cobble stone court yard. I was pretty sure if I could only reach a flat stable surface I could regain my balance and my dignity. Unluckily, my beautiful so grown-up high-heel caught in the cobble stones and I went flying. I didn’t even get my hands out  to catch myself. My open purse, scattering it’s contents, flew about 3 feet away, along with my planner, and my dignity went right along with it. My skirt ripped up the side seam and my knee started bleeding profusely. I was too humiliated to ever go back for the second interview.