“I finally had a chance to sit down and read through your blogs. Bloody hilarious I tell you! Though I do worry if I hang out with you I will either a) end up seeing you naked, b) be inadvertently told about your sex life or c) mauled by loveable pets.”
In my reply, I assured her that I would be on my best behaviour. I of course blamed it on the universe. It’s the universe I tell you! For some reason I am the target for the ridiculous. I explained that I have tried to put my armour on (prayers) for protection but these little bullets just seem to get through and expose me. Hahaha
Oh well I suppose I have to entertain the few followers I have and I seem to do that rather well. Even in Johannesburg chaos reigned. What can I say- These invasions followed me…
I arrived on Tuesday after a long journey and my body was screaming for a replacement or for a good body massage. As I neared Johannesburg, I felt my head begin to throb and it was only when Cheryl told me that it was the change in the atmosphere that has caused this migraine that hit me without warning.
I fetched Cait and Sarah from their place of work and I have to admit I was a little tense when I arrived at their lovely home. For some reason I stress about silly things and that night I decided I had not brought enough food as I was feeding the girls and myself and had arranged a dinner for later in the week. I was expecting more than 10 people and I went into panic mode. I sent Bern a text, admonished her for not giving me three bags or frozen chicken pieces, and really felt my stress levels rise to almost tears. In my defense – I was exhausted from the trip and my head was really pounding. Now let me explain – three bags of frozen chicken would feed my family for two weeks and I was only going to be there for 4 days. Now maybe you can understand just how disharmonious I was.
Thank goodness, Bern realized this was just my way of coping with the journey and I see elephants so to speak when there aren’t any. I suppose after 10 years Bern should know me by now.
Needless to say, my girls also recognized the signs and promptly told me to sit down and relax as they prepared dinner and when I tried to go to the car to fetch my luggage they blasted me and told me to RELAX DAMIT. All tearful and silly I softly said, I need my charger for my phone and I was petulant like a child and did my pacing up and down. Oh my Goodness, I really need therapy. Get a grip Michelle, you really need to learn to relax and let it be.
Easy words I am sure to hear, but not so easy to do. I think I have been conditioned through years of having to handle situations on my own before Bern arrived that I tend to go into this: “Do it right Now mode before it becomes this huge monster that is out of control.” Not a bad motto to have I don’t think but I have to learn that the world does not come to and end if it is not done right away and I do have people around who are willing to help – I must just ask for help. Something I am not very good at doing I might add.The evening progressed rather well. The food was lovely and I felt a certain calm being in the company of my girls, which includes Dom Sarah’s best friend who is family too in my books.
He quickly withdrew his hand and went bright red, which turned to purple and added, “I wondered why Cait’s legs were so smooth. Well my headache which was dissipating shot up in pain reaching a high threshold as I burst out laughing and the giggles hit me like only they can when I am over tired and in between fits of laughter. I told Cait she was in essence marrying someone just like her dad as Adrian had this habit of mistaking my mom for me and would pinch her on the bottom or walk up behind her and give her a hug or as mentioned in a previous blog. He has also climbed into bed with her at my cousin’s house thinking that was our room. Cait giggled just as hard as I did and when I added, “there I thought I had lost it and was no longer appealing, my Rich felt me up!”
Poor Rich did not know where to hide his face and he tried to mumble excuses but my girls of course bombarded him with “admit it, you just wanted to feel our mother up – you pervert and we teased him for hours. I gracefully removed my leg off Cait’s lap and kept an eye on his hands after that – only teasing it was just such a funny thing to see shy Rich trying to be all nonchalant and his reaction kept us entertained. Cait told him that her legs were always smooth – bit then with a shy giggle, she did admit that in winter NOT SO MUCH! Something about growing a winter coat to ward off the Johannesburg winters. It was very funny. I of course had to let Bern know via a text message that Richy had just felt my leg thinking it was Cait’s leg and I was in a puddle of giggles because of it. Rich who I have to force a hug out of and a kiss hello – committed the error of invading my personal bubble. Never in a million years did I think he would ever be so forward. By the end of the evening, I had a sore head and extremely sore stomach muscles for laughing.
Bern is now working with me in Durban. She is the Operations manager and I am finally able to have the freedom to sell and not have to worry about queries, collections or drive aways - as we have now opened our own branch and with very little teething problems, I might add. It is now my responsibility to make it profitable. Hence my trip to Johannesburg – I needed to get work coming into Durban and increase our volumes of freight. This went extremely well and of the seven customers, I went to see six wanted to sign on immediately. It would have been quite a nice feather in my cap but my boss has declined two of them and they were big. I understand her reasons as they do carry a risk and the one client uses every excuse in the book "not to pay" and he receives payment from his clients after refusing to pay his current carrier– he is a broker for courier work. This is unfair and if we are as a little as 3 minutes late with a overnight delivery he sees this as a service failure regardless of the reason for the “Late” delivery and refuses to pay for the delivery. What this means is we have incurred the costs of collecting from his clients – paid the airline to fly it to its destination and delivered to the receiving client and all this has been done for no payment in return. We have situations where our driver is made to wait for 20 minutes plus for the receiver to come from his or her office to sign for the parcel and this is now considered a service failure. I am disappointed as I did feel this could have been discussed and sorted out in a Service level Agreement, but the risk is all ours and this could result in our company running at a loss. I have not given up on this deal yet and possibly with a little bit of negotiating and contracts the client may see things our way and agree to our terms.
However, all is not lost. One of the clients I saw is a very big account and I had so many buying signals from her I could have signed her up right there and then but I had no rates prepared as this was purely a fact finding mission. I entertained her in the meeting by telling her how we use one of their adverts in our drinking Game Kings and the unfortunate person has to sing their advert and add in a few extra words for entertainment. Lindiwe thought this was amusing and sang along with me. I had taken our Johannesburg Customer services woman with and she was quite taken aback when I burst into song - yes into song in the middle of a negotiations. What can I say; if the mood is right, I just let it all hang out. picture it in your head – There we are, sitting in a boardroom, very posh and very dignified with this incredibly well educated high powered executive who is instrumental in deciding if we get the business and I burst into song. Well it worked and she was very impressed with our or should I say my enthusiasm and has agreed to taking the negotiations further and I have a really good feeling about this client. On the other hand, I could have read the whole situation wrong and she was just very happy to see me leave!
My trip to Johannesburg was a nice eye opener for me and my confidence levels - as I felt I had lost my gift for selling as the Durban people are not quick to change and they are so slow in making decisions and this has lead to be losing faith in myself. So when I text’ Bern I was thrilled to say “I’ve got it YES I’ve still got it” and did my famous little victory dance in the parking lot at the client’s premises, which is a cross between the American footballs players dance and our famous toy-toy dance our workers perform when they are on strike here in South Africa. Thandi my work colleague who is a graceful beautiful woman looked on at me with a puzzled expression on her face – Ok, ok so it could not have looked that dignified but I was happy to feel the adrenalin rush of a good appointment and the possibilities of signing up one of the largest distributions for the company - Blame this on my re-constructed knee which has thrown my balance and rhythm right out the window. Therefore, it comes out looking like a pregnant woman needing a trip to the ladies. I admit it – I really miss the corporate world when it comes to sales and the professionalism (ok not me so much) of the Johannesburg clients. At least with them, you know where you stand and when they say they will get back to you – you know they will. There is none of this waiting 6 months for an answer and they mean it when they say, “Yes we are interested”. Unlike Durban people who do not feel it is polite to decline a request for an appointment – or they are simply just curious to see what I look like and agree to the appointment….very typical of the Durban Men in this area. Boy are they in for a surprise when I walk in – all five foot 2 inches of roundness with Hair, that is ALIVE and they were expecting something else. SERVES THEM RIGHT FOR NOT BEING PROFESSIONAL. I do enjoy asking them during the meeting if they agreed to the meeting for better courier services or was it simply an opportunity to see what I looked like. A few of them had been honest enough to admit that they wanted to see what I looked like as apparently I have a nice phone voice. This reminds me of a manager trying to describe a tele sales person to another staff member- although not a very polite or nice description – this not so nice manager described this person in this manner “she has a face for radio presentation”. I hope the clients who meet me do not feel this way when I walk into their offices. I am sure we have all experienced that – we speak to someone and conjure up this vision of what they look like and if they have this amazing voice we automatically decide they must be drop dead gorgeous to go along with the voice. Only to find that they are not actually anything to write home about and are a little disappointed only to realize they feel the same way after meeting you. Hahaha. Oh well we use our gifts God has given us and if my voice opens appointments for me well then, I hope my natural sales talent does the rest. It has worked in the past for me – let’s hope I finally manage to get the Durban people to join my fan club? Listen, miracles have been known to happen.
Tabby has fallen in love with Bern’s mom. It is a mad scramble in the evenings for mom to reach her room before Tabby gets there. Now mom is slow due to Parkinson’s and age so of course Tabby wins – but mom still thinks she can out run Tabby. Have you ever tried to out run a kitten? Not going to happen. The other night Tabby and Angel decided they needed to redecorate her room. They broke her reading lamp, rearranged her clothing that were on her bed. Mom’s missal was lying on the floor, her glasses had been pushed under the bed and they had somehow managed to pull the blankets off the bed. The kittens had quite a free for all. This morning Bern brought tabby through to me drenched – Tabby had fallen into the bath again as she has this need to drink warm water and must have lent in too deep and fell in. You would think a sudden brush with death would distress a cat? Not Tabby, no she was thrilled and went back for more when Bern climbed into the bath after she had been dried and cuddled.
As for the publishers who have shown an interest in the book - I am very skeptical and have been warned that there are many Pirates out there who never do anything with the manuscript. They actually just bleed you dry of more money for suggested changes and editing and they manage to get the author so excited that in their glow of possible success and possible greatness they foresee for themselves. In their ignorance, they happily fork out thousands of Dollars or Pounds in the hope that one day they will be rich and famous. I do not however fall into this category. I know my works are not great and that they will not make the literary world take notice and jump up and down for book signings – so when I receive mails saying “there is a market for your book and we have a sister company who will be contacting you shortly; after advertising that they do not ask for any money or payment for getting your book published , “After all this is their job function” I do feel a flutter of excitement and then the skeptical side takes over and I keep my money on my bank and wait for the right time and keep hoping that there are honest old fashioned agents and publishers out there who will be genuine and actually give me the opportunity to see if my book is worth while publishing.
Well the bottom line is they want money from me and if you use the exchange rate, it’s like looking for pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Then I am expected to do the marketing. My question is “Now how do I market the book from here?” One author from England telephoned me and advised me to find an agent in New York and let them see if it is worth publishing and after I have received many rejections, I can pay them to help edit my book until it "is considered great." So in essence, what they are offering is actually a printing function and the books will be available to order on line. Information about exposure, marketing or anything is clouded– a little bit too “iffy” for me. The author who telephone me after I posted a question on his website about how do we know the real self-publishers or publishers from the pirates explained that there are many sharks out there. To test this he sent them his dishwasher manual and added WASHY WASHY WASHY throughout the manuscript and he received rave reviews with the exact same response “there is a market for your book and we have a sister company who will be contacting you shortly” he then tested this company again and sent one of Emile Bronte’s works to them and the publisher responded as before; “We are interested ....."But added that he would have to get an editor involved and work on his manuscript before it was deemed "GOOD enough." I bet Emile Bronte is most impressed with these comments.
There are so many sharks out there and it is all about money and not searching for talent and possibly fulfilling someone’s dream. In the mean time, I will continue to write as this is my love and no one is going to tell me my work is crap - I will not have my joy taken from me. The children’s book all 308 pages needs some serious editing and I will get stuck into that as time allows. Until then I will focus on my talent to consult with clients who need a reliable courier service and rely on my natural ability to make people smile and giggle at the chaos that reigns in my life – thereby giving me more material or my book and enjoy doing it.
Brenda helped with this while I was in Johannesburg. On Wednesday after a grueling day at work and a headache that made me feel like my eyes were going to burst out of my head – I went to go and see my friend Brenda who was in Johannesburg because she had recently lost her father. Brenda and I have been friends since childhood, we share many a wonderful memory, and seeing her was like taking a sip of cool water after being in the desert for years. Her joy in life and never-ending resolve to be a better person makes me so grateful to call her my best friend. Regardless of the hardships she has faced in health and other areas, Brenda keeps on facing the world with a smile and a giggle. When God chose his angels, he decided that some of them had to come to earth in human form. Brenda is one of his angels and I am so grateful that he gave her to me as I have learnt so much from her. Her inner strength and ability to overcome Cancer and not be a victim has shown me that this world we share does have a plan for us and if we just listen and actually hear - we will find our path and find happiness and peace.
I arrived where Brenda was staying with a headache that was threatening to kill me. After sitting in her company for half an hour I felt the tension leave my body and my headache became this soft thud. I reveled in her stories and giggled at her comments of sitting in a boardroom as one of the top executives making decisions and silently asking herself how on earth she got there? Brenda still feels like her 15-year-old self with pigtails and not being able to reach the floor as she sits in the boardroom chairs - all dolled up and commenting and making decisions. No she commented that inside she still feels like the teenager playing squash with me in our home town screeching with laughter, discussing boys and one day when we get married . Reminding me of how our squash games eventually landed up with us sitting on the floor hitting the squash ball as we had giggled ourselves into a pool of tears and laughter. Yes, we all have our 15 year old inside us and do look back and wonder how we got to where we are today. My fear is that one day someone will see through my ACT and ask me whom I think I am kidding when I sit in a boardroom and address people like Brenda who are powerful business people. I giggle at the thought and know that somehow I manage to pull it off and amaze myself that they do not see this 15 year old disguised in my now aged body and wrinkles with a keen love of life. No somehow, I fool them and see a woman who has confidence in herself and her product she is presenting – thank goodness for that!
I enjoyed a lovely afternoon with Brenda, Roz, Trevor, and Aunty Beryl even though the circumstances of visiting her were sad and we reminisced about her dad who was my second father for so many years. We managed to console ourselves with the knowledge that he was no longer in pain and was able to tinker around with engines again and be Mr. Fix it and we knew that now heaven would run smoothly and efficiently. I reluctantly left them and returned to my girls’ flat and braved the Johannesburg traffic.
All my girls greeted me on arrival, Sarah, Cait, Dom and Shane… such a warm lovely welcoming. I love their energy and excitement for life and it was fun trying to keep up with their conversations as they shared their thoughts, dreams and situations they found themselves in. As the evening wore on, I felt my head ache almost completely gone until Dom decided she needed to share how she received this very large bruise on her leg.
Hysterical is not a good enough description – it was a combination of the three stooges and Charlie Chaplin all in one. Dom being Charlie Chaplin and instead of three stooges there were four of us. Sarah, Cait, Shane and me. After taking a few more pain pills after the migraine bomb had not worked, I became this giggling schoolgirl with them. Everything was funny, my head was now in another hemisphere and I just had to accept that the colours I was seeing was quite normal and to just ignore the crescendo of pain in my head. Cait looked at me and she then sent me to bed. “Mom, go to bed – you are over tired!” Nice, I was now the child and she was the mother. So cute, I did eventually go to bed and kept Cait up until she snored in my face and I was left alone in the darkness to think about how blessed I am to have my wonderful family, friends and the possibility of new adventures still to come.
Cait is still a bit confused on how she managed to get into bed on Thursday evening after consuming a few glasses of wine with Shane - this was a giggle all on its own. Shane carried her and I opened the bed covers and we unceremoniously dumped her on the bed. Cait somehow managed to wrap her legs around the blankets and it was like trying to remove spaghetti from a carpet. She did not wake up and we shoved her and pulled at the blankets and had this sweet snore escaping from her perfectly formed lips!
Life is good and there are so many opportunities out there. We just have to have the courage to take them and ask for them. Just like my sweet timid colleague did in my meeting with our potential client – she asked for the business and it looks like we are going to be granted it. So do not be scared to dream big or to ask for that miracle or favour – we all are given what we need – not what we want and it happens when we least expect it.
No comments:
Post a Comment