This weekend our company had one of its Christmas parties. One of its parties, for a company with over 20000 employees (plus their dates) has to have several. Saturday was our turn, and it was an intimate affair of 2400 people. I was eyeing the whole thing quite cynically, of course, uneasy with the idea of dolling up and chirping politely while using the right spoon to eat a tepid potage without taste.

In a feeble attempt to deny my corpofication, I got my hair done eighties punkette style, and wore my “ripped in that studied way” designer dress. Oooh. Do we dare?

Anyway, I thought my worst fears confirmed when I entered and saw a line of suits conga-ing badly to a Gloria Gaynor cover. But fate was to be kinder to us. Our group ended up seated together, right next to the generous open bar, far from the pointy-haired set. A strange but wonderful real-party-within-a-fake-party developed.

It was totally unintentional on the part of the company, and I doubt such lightning will ever strike again at future “club social” events, but we actually had fun.