I am very lucky to work with a few people I love. That’s right. Love. Maybe it’s weird to some people to have their colleagues tell them they love them from time to time (and to say it back), but with my circle of friends, it’s perfectly natural. Mary Richards loved her co-workers. Why can’t I?
Since we’re professors, we’re not all “in” on the same days, so it was a treat for me to pop by Jim’s office last week and to find the extra chair in his office unoccupied. I plopped down without waiting for an invitation, complained about one of my more challenging classes while Jim sang the praises of his students. After a few minutes of this, he asked if he could read me a poem he’d taught in class that day. For some reason, this made me feel as if I needed to be eating something, so I took out the pastry (homemade cherry danish) I’d bought on my way to school and waited…
The First Time I Robbed Tiffany’s by Norman Stock
The first time I robbed Tiffany’s it was raining, and it was dark, and the wind was blowing. It was like the first time I had sex. The same kind of weather, the same kind of feeling. Me and the girl in the car. Just like me and the cop in the car, after he arrested me outside the store in the rain. I promised myself I would do better next time. Just like I promised the girl. Just like I promised the cop. It felt like it always felt, me and the cop, me and the girl, me and the rain, and the wind and the darkness, and the robbery I never committed, the sex I never had, the girl I never knew, the feel I never copped, and the rain the rain the rain was all I knew and all I will ever know.
How could you not love a colleague who reads that kind of poem to you, chuckling along the way?
