I worked retail until about half-way through college, and at one point someone even promoted me to a store manager. You know what? I hate managing people. I like people, and I love having people to talk to, but I hate managing people. I am terrible at it, mostly because I trust people and when you hire people at barely more than minimum wage, apparently trusting them not to rob you blind is inadvisable. Maybe it’s more that I hate managing people in a retail environment since I’ve done some training and the psuedo-supervisory duties that come with that at professional jobs and that was actually a great experience.
Anyway, by then I think I’d already grown my hair out again, but you never know. It was supposed to be a pretty trendy little boutique, and I don’t think the ambiguous sexuality my haircut to the left here implied would have been an issue so long as I wore some nice slacks and nail polish. At that time, I was an assistant manager at two different stores in the same mall (yes, I worked a lot of hours) so I was a pretty familiar face to other mall employees. What with being around all the time. One day, I decided to go for something new and I chopped my hair off fairly short, leaving just enough for a half pony tail up top and then buzzing the bottom half. And that is how the girls at one of the department stores nicknamed me “that angry dike”.
That was certainly not the last time anyone has looked at me and instantly assumed I was a lesbian (much to my later boss’s irritation, because whenever we were out people always thought we were together), which I don’t mind at all. What I do mind is the language, which is unacceptable. It’s also likely to get you punched in the face if you say it in public, so word to the wise! You don’t have to be “politically correct,” but I do recommend not being an asshole.
