#oneandonly

A few weeks back, my fleshy, dimply thighs bore a striking resemblance to two stamped hams; two pink triangular trapeziums of human woman, each branded with an identical violet diamond high and centre, looking much like Christian Grey might have had a go at me with a mallet.

But we all know... I am just not that lucky.

I’m the girl who gets laughed at, the girl who stands out, the girl who is more often than not the butt of the joke; likely a joke about butts. I’m the girl who makes jokes about herself to take the sting out of yours. I’m the girl who writes a blog about how awkward and unfortunate she is, an antidote for her tears. I am the girl who cries wolf so that my voice louder than yours. I’m the girl that spends a day outdoors and bruises like a peach.

In order to keep this light and breezy, we’ll focus on just how stupid I am, a stupidity that has left my fleshy envelope permanently marked from head to toe.

The first time I ever went on a team-building day away, I was left with scars on the undersides of my feet. The delicate pads under my toes were shredded by the sharp razor sharp edges of oyster shells. At Planet Hollywood, being part of a team required the ability to walk through shallow water, at 3am, wearing only your swimsuit, inky dark water hiding the fertile oyster beds below.

Recognising the searing pain in my toes, fearful that the leaking blood might attract rather more carnivorous marine life, I flung myself backward and raised the injured foot as high as I could without sinking. (Go on, picture it, and piss yourself laughing, I would.) Blinded by panic, I flung myself backward directly onto the oyster shells and simultaneously cut open my palms and lacerated my butt cheeks.

Two days on a houseboat in Cronulla, already feeling vulnerable because I was the only girl wearing a swimsuit rather than a triangle bikini, vulnerable because my skin quickly turned red while everyone else bronzed and honeyed, vulnerable because being witty and clever isn’t really useful when you’re stuck on a boat in the middle of the harbour with 10 oafs and 5 strumpets, I returned home with a permanent reminder of just how much of a team player I was, a silver wishbone under my middle left toe.

After Bruce’s Burger Joint I moved into the Cathedral of Colourful Coffee.

Determined to prove my love for the Sage Siren and her Caffeinated Concoctions, I actually had a starring role in a 2-day adventure in the Hunter Valley, on a farm, under the sun, crawling with spiders, infested with snakes and no less than an hour from the nearest trained medical professionals.

The various attendees would be blessed, as they were welcomed onsite. I, dressed as an Ethiopian Farm Women, brewing and brazing coffee over an open fire, would bless them. I would recite a poem recounting the magical powers of coffee, they would laugh at me, we’d all get changed into our outdoors wear and go orienteering. Halle-fucking-ujah, coffee is so magical it will help you overcome the pain of being paid pennies per hour to wake up at stupid o’clock and spend your days blending dairy fat with sugar and ice for the Arabella’s and Nigel’s of the Eastern Suburbs.

Not so much a team building away day, as an opportunity to consume one’s body weight in alcohol was a weekend spent on Queensland’s Gold Coast. Now working, as I was, for an entrepreneur, the rules that a large American outfit followed to a T were thrown aside in favour of better booze and cleaner coke. That trip broke my favourite shoes and my spirit. A few months later I left the country.

Welcomed into the Silicon sleeve of high technology, where profits soar and share prices skyrocket to the beat of an avaricious generation, team days take on a more challenging, ever more athletic level. The valley is a place where one proves just how dedicated one is by pushing one’s body to the outer limits. One doesn’t drink, one hydrates. One doesn’t sleep, one restores. One doesn’t belong, one is.

Be it hours spent riding through a forest facing into glacial winds, scaling an indoor wall, descending a mountain or crawling through mud, I sweat, I swear, and I muse on the fact that I was explicitly employed for my intellectual capacity not gymnastic flexibility. I wonder at why I must prove that I am Bear Grylls to be accepted.

If I had ever remotely imagined that I was skilled enough in adventurous pursuits, I would have pursued a career as a Bungee Jump Instructor, or as a National Park Ranger, or as a Fucking Crocodile Hunter. I chose to become a Human Resources Professional because I value my human resources; I value them so much I prefer to keep them on level flat ground well away from wildlife, nature and any kind of soil that wasn’t fabricated by a Michelin starred chef.

I propose we spend a day analysing the relevant merits of Shakespeare’s comedies. Perhaps we could experiment with a sitting in a meeting room, discussing the political fallout of taking military action against religious fanatics or gun enthusiasts? How about a team day discussing the historical and cultural significance of sites visited during a holiday spent somewhere other than Bali or Hawaii or Ibiza?

Drinking this might help..

Maybe I’m not cut out to be part of a team, maybe I can’t blend in, maybe my loud voice was made to be heard, maybe I’m the one and only, maybe I’m just meant to be by myself because I was given too much to say, too much to think about and not enough ways of using the word awesome in a sentence.

Maybe, just maybe, I really like me, and I really like you, and really like that we’re different, and that really is Ok.