It’s been ages since I’ve felt the urge to write. And I’ve felt pretty guilty about it. But with the world being what it is, I felt like my thoughts: my woes and realizations, observations, were somehow insignificant compared to the severity of the issues at hand: racism, the media circus of government, the pandemic. Who am I to bleat out my struggles in times as seemingly momentous as now?

Until this one thought slammed me in the face, and I can’t seem to shake it. I wait a few days, and it still lingers, like a drug store perfume that won’t let evaporate.

Last month, we had to do our personal evaluations for work. In the past, this seemed to me to be a “shift from inbox to outbox” activity, and nothing worth any weight in the trajectory of my career. I set stretch goals – I mostly meet them. I challenge myself the next year, and satisfy that challenge. However, this year, I learned that these self-evals are the crux of what sets the trajectory for your career. And you can’t just satisfy your goals, even if you set lofty one. You have to EXCEED ALL OF THEM to even be noticed.

Let me take a step back.

When I was a little kid, about 5 or 6, I was given a test, and sent through a special program in elementary school for “gifted children”. These were children who supposedly were in the top 2%- both intellectually and from an educational potential standpoint. From 1-5 grades, I went through a highly accelerated learning program. By the end, there were a few dozen kids, looking doe-eyed and disheveled, entering a regular 6-grade classroom with a college level education, and no social skills. There was no long-term plan for us: we were just test subjects. Ones who could read Proust, discuss Calculus and the impact of Bach on the social strata of the 18th century, but had no idea how to join a game of dodgeball in the school yard. And a sleepover? What was that?

And so began this state of not fitting in – I was not the brightest of the “gifted” group – in fact, I probably was the slowest of the pack; and I was too smart for the rest of the kids, who found me “oddly adult and weird”. So, I befriended adults until high school.

In 8th grade, I was given another test (this time, with everyone else in the grade) and was told if my score was high enough, I could test out of the last year of middle school, and forego public high school, instead being placed into one of the three elite high schools in New York City: Stuyvesant High, Bronx HS of Science, or Brooklyn Tech.

I wanted to go to Performing Arts High School. I wanted to be like the kids on the “Fame” tv show, and break out into song and dance in the hallways on the way to my next class, and jump off cafeteria tables into elaborate dance numbers with the other kids.

My mother said, “no way”.

So, I took the test, and was hoping for Stuyvesant, because a) that year it was the top school of the three, and b) it was the only one in Manhattan, and I hadn’t ever been outside of Manhattan to go to school.

I got accepted into Bronx Science.

Thus began a new experience. An experience of being completely in the minority. As a highly academic science and math high school, most of the student body was of Asian descent. Also, I was definitely not a popular kid: I didn’t join any clubs, even though the chess club was just as prestigious as the drama club – and I was too shy for either. I floated around my first year in a nebulae of nothingness. I took the bus from my apartment to school and back, and was either ignored by the cool kids, or badgered by the bullies.

I found my “tribe” my sophomore year, with a group of boys (and their girlfriends), who called themselves (unofficially) “The Scoundrels”. They weren’t any specific stereotype: they weren’t goth, nor stoners (well, maybe a bit), they were definitely not jocks, nor were they overly cerebral. Just a bunch of teens that, for whatever reason, would have me. Sort of.

In those years, I felt like more of the mascot, than a group member. I didn’t date any of them, but I also wasn’t cool enough to be one of the ring leaders. I was just a hanger-on. But it was somewhere to fit, even it it felt false and sad.

I remember when we took the SATs. I had the biggest anxiety attack the night before. My mother took pity on me, and gave me 10mg of Valium. Didn’t work. I was groggy and exhausted at the testing. And when the test scores were released, I was called to the Guidance Counselors office to discuss my score. I had the third lowest score in my grade. How would I make anything of myself? What could I possibly hope to accomplish with that terrible grade.

I got a 1400 out of 1600.

Fast-forward to college. I won’t get into the details here (I’ll save that for another post) but it was the act of stumbling into the theater department that finally made me feel like I belonged. Because the theater was a group of smart kids who didn’t fit anywhere else. Kids that could wax philosophical, and also enjoy walking around in paper mache clothing. And I blossomed.

Going from school to a career was another speed bump: I didn’t feel talented enough to make a go of acting as a profession. There were surely thousands of people more talented than me. Certainly ones who could get the the truth of the character better than me, and without over-intellectualizing the process (see elementary school “experiment” above). So, I decided to enter the regular work force. But I had no training, no classes, and no idea what I could do.

Again, I’ll save it for another post, but I managed to stumble blindly into marketing, and again, that seemed a good fit. A great combination of analytical thinking and creativity to satisfy both sides of the brain. But now, I have no education, nor experience to compete with people my age in the field. By the time I figured it out, I am in my late 20’s, and my contemporaries were mid-level managers. So, I started on the bottom, and did a lot of “fake it ’til I make it”.

Which leads us, dear readers, to where I am today. And to the beginning of this post.

For the past 26 years, I have worked in many many companies, doing many many marketing endeavors. I have grown and learned and specialized and moved up in terms of responsibilities. And, when I felt there was no way to grown in a position, I would go somewhere else, get a raise from the change of company, and continue to learn and grow. Rinse and repeat.

The consequence is this: I have never, ever been promoted. I’ve had salary increases, for sure. But I have no skills on how to advance your career within an organization. I honestly have no clue. When I wanted to change my “career trajectory” I just got another job at another company. And while I definitely feel that I am smarter than many people in my profession on certain aspects of my job, I am completely illiterate on the basic acts of socialization, and development. And I have no formal education on even the very basics of marketing as a foundation. An impostor, if you will.

So, I ask you: what am I doing? Where am I going? How do I impact my company, my field, humanity, when I am walking around stuck in the middle, with no destination that feels like solid ground? With no route to the endpoint, or even an idea of what the endpoint should be?

And, does it even matter? Does the nihilistic part of me believe that none of this has any true purpose, or meaning, in the end?

“We all change, when you think about it. We’re all different people all through our lives. And that’s OK, that’s good, you gotta keep moving, so long as you remember all the people that you used to be.”

The Doctor