Short, sharp shock
I was out for drinks with an old friend of mine, H, last night. We first met and became friends during an internship we did together about six years ago for The Devil Himself (aka a fast-moving consumer goods company). She's blonde, has a degree from Oxbridge, and is a smart, smart cookie. I hadn't seen her in years, mainly because we'd both been so insanely busy and our schedules just wouldn't match up.
So, there we are, finally grabbing an hour after work to down a latte and a glass of wine in rapid succession, and catch up on jobs and men and life. And we're trading sob stories - "and then this happened, and it was awful, and then that happened, and it was worse" and she suddenly turns to me and says, "I'm so glad to see you. It's been such a long time, and I have so few female friends now. It gets really... lonely."
Which surprised me quite a bit, because H is bright and bubbly and everyone loves her, boys and girls alike. As it turns out, 'everyone' does to extend to the rest of her team, who are CBWs (city boy wankers). She doesn't go out with them after work. "No one invites me. And I can't really join in their conversations most of the time anyway, so it's not likely to be fun even if I just turn up. What do I have to say about football or how many women they had sex with the previous weekend?"
It's been a while since a friend of mine has had such a direct experience of feeling alienated because of gender (that they've told me about, anyway), because everyone else tends to work in female-friendly environments: theatre, PR, even town-planning are all female-friendly. And my office may have only male bosses, but look around and you'll see that all the managers are female, and half the general workforce. For a professional services firm, my department is ok when it comes to the gender mix (at my level, anyway).
H, on the other hand, works with men. All men. Exclusively men. Just men. As in, she is the only girl outside the secretarial pool. And it just so happens that she's little and blonde and perky, or was, until it dawned on her that little and blonde and perky don't lead to good appraisals. So when I met her, she was little, and blonde, and wearing a severe all-black suit, and not in the least bit perky. And it's sad.
What's even more depressing is how disappointed she looked when I had to go, and how eager she was for us to meet up again. "Soon," she said. "When are you next free?"
So, there we are, finally grabbing an hour after work to down a latte and a glass of wine in rapid succession, and catch up on jobs and men and life. And we're trading sob stories - "and then this happened, and it was awful, and then that happened, and it was worse" and she suddenly turns to me and says, "I'm so glad to see you. It's been such a long time, and I have so few female friends now. It gets really... lonely."
Which surprised me quite a bit, because H is bright and bubbly and everyone loves her, boys and girls alike. As it turns out, 'everyone' does to extend to the rest of her team, who are CBWs (city boy wankers). She doesn't go out with them after work. "No one invites me. And I can't really join in their conversations most of the time anyway, so it's not likely to be fun even if I just turn up. What do I have to say about football or how many women they had sex with the previous weekend?"
It's been a while since a friend of mine has had such a direct experience of feeling alienated because of gender (that they've told me about, anyway), because everyone else tends to work in female-friendly environments: theatre, PR, even town-planning are all female-friendly. And my office may have only male bosses, but look around and you'll see that all the managers are female, and half the general workforce. For a professional services firm, my department is ok when it comes to the gender mix (at my level, anyway).
H, on the other hand, works with men. All men. Exclusively men. Just men. As in, she is the only girl outside the secretarial pool. And it just so happens that she's little and blonde and perky, or was, until it dawned on her that little and blonde and perky don't lead to good appraisals. So when I met her, she was little, and blonde, and wearing a severe all-black suit, and not in the least bit perky. And it's sad.
What's even more depressing is how disappointed she looked when I had to go, and how eager she was for us to meet up again. "Soon," she said. "When are you next free?"