Day 38 (Sunday 7th January 2018)
 |
| 38 years ago on 7th January 1980, Indira Gandhi was voted back into power in India, with a landslide majority. Despite her surname she is not related to Mahatma Gandhi, but is part of the Nehru political dynasty. She was Prime Minister from January 1966 to March 1977 and then again from the start of 1980 until her assassination in October 1984. She was one of the earliest female heads of government - only preceded by Sirimavo Bandaranaike the Prime Minister of Ceylon, who was elected in July 1960. |
Today Is it me or are the days speeding up? It is Sunday already. Our decorations are down and the house feels strangely empty.
Today's post is by Angela Mortimer, the Founder and Director of one of
Europe’s most successful recruitment consultancies, Angela Mortimer Plc. Established in 1976, the company currently
employs people in offices across London, New York, Brussels,
Amsterdam, Paris, Geneva, Lyon, Sao Paulo, Shanghai and Hong Kong and provides people for clients around the globe. Angela Mortimer has developed the careers of more
than 200,000 individuals, mainly female, since its foundation. Angela believes passionately
in the need to encourage everyone especially women, to achieve their maximum
potential. She seeks to inspire
confidence and positive thinking by sharing insights developed over 40
years through training, public speaking and her blogs. You can follow her on Twitter (her handle is @AngelaMortime3 - but she is less active than many due to time constraints).
For a number of years Angela was a visiting
lecturer on the Mountbatten programme in New York and supported graduates in
finding placements after their Internship.
Angela has made numerous appearances on television, radio and in the press, including documentaries about The
British at Work on the BBC, Women in the Workplace, which was aired on television
and radio, and on on the unique nature of the company she owns. Angela is a patron and founder sponsor of the National
Youth Ballet with an involvement motivated by the desire to foster the themes
of women, youth and excellence, and, for several years, Angela worked with the
International Centre for Prison Studies counselling prison governors.
For over 12 years Angela served on both the Confederation
of British Industries SME Council and The London Council of the Confederation
of British Industry. In 2009 Angela was
the winner of The First Women Awards for Business Services in association with
Lloyds TSB Corporate Markets and supported by the CBI, and, in July 2003,
Angela won the European Women of Achievement Awards in the Entrepreneur section.
More recently, Angela was recognised by the Staffing Industry Analysts as one
of the top 50 in their Global Power 100 – Women in Staffing list.
Her post is NOT to do with business but it is a lovely read.
Her post is NOT to do with business but it is a lovely read.
*******************************
I’m a self-admitted crybaby. When I was pregnant I would regularly
dissolve into tears at the sound of the little girl asking her mother as she
washed the dishes ‘what makes your hands so soft?” It’s embarrassing but the truth and it
happened more than once with the same Fairy Liquid advert and was witnessed by
astonished friends so couldn’t be denied.
Don't get me wrong – I can be strong when
needed as is proven frequently in the office and on the golf course. I can manage threats, disappointment and fear
with a measure of equanimity but I have this low threshold of crying when
touched by nostalgia and when touched by the kindness of another toward me.
An example comes to mind of an
extraordinary kindness shown me some thirty odd years ago when my time was
stretched thinly between home, office and two children under the age of 5.
At that period in my life I was busy
practicing being Superwoman. I could
manage everything in 24 hours that an organized energetic modern woman had
expected of her – make lots of money, be trim and sleek after a 6 a.m. swim in
the open air pool and spring effortlessly into my spiky shoes and designer suit
ready to slay clients with my expertise and easy charm. I disappointed no one – that was simply not
my game.
I left my housekeeper a note that day – we
had been entertaining and had run out of standard groceries and all the stuff
that a family gets through at the end of a big week end – asking for a lot of
basic shopping to be done. My Housekeeper
was more a wife to me. She was Portuguese,
long married and did not have a bank account of her own when she joined me. In her family it was not considered appropriate
or respectful for a wife to be this independent. I persuaded her to open one so I could
provide her with a float for my shopping.
This was a good system though her husband remained unaware of it for
some time – easier that way.
At the end of my twelve-hour day I returned
to the house to find a phenomenal number of soft white bread rolls were in the
kitchen. There must have been a hundred
of them. What on earth are they doing
here I wanted to know. ‘Well you asked me
to get them but I’m sorry, there aren’t 100 rolls, there are only 80 because
though I drove all over town I could not find any more – the bakers and
supermarkets were out of stock – I cleaned them out’! And then she burst into tears because she
had failed me. I was still mystified as
to how she can have thought I wanted them till she showed me my note. There in black and white was my writing and
clearly listed was ‘loo rolls’ looking like ‘100 rolls’.
Well that was when I started to laugh till
I cried. I laughed at my clumsy failure
to communicate with my lovely helper who was challenged in her second language
to understand my written slang and I cried because she was so upset to have
failed me with the shortfall. And then we both laughed and cried together
and that was a very good cry indeed and a happy one. We stayed together for 25 years as a very
good team and never forgot that day – a classic in miscommunication.
And that made me reflect on the astonishing
range of opportunity we have to fail to communicate effectively with others
unless we are meticulous in our spoken and written words. A serious thought and a useful one to hold in
mind as we enter this special time in the year when overloaded with nostalgia
in every advertisement we see for a perfectly unattainable perfect Christmas and New Year, emotions
might more readily be tipped from positive to sad.
And now - if you want a really good happy
cry, go see Paddington Two but take a box of tissues – no spoiler – you might
need them, I did! Happy New Year.
