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Look Again
Wrong the first time
by Stephanie Piper
The older I get, the less I know.
I’m not just talking about Baby-Boomer memory loss here, the missing car keys and the life organized by Post-it notes. I’m talking about that keen intuition I used to claim as my personal parlor trick, my sixth sense about people and situations.
I once believed I could size people up at a glance. I could pick out the faux intellectual, the closet geek and the secret bigot across a crowded cocktail party and have them typed and filed before the second round of drinks was served.
How do you know that? Someone would ask me. You’ve barely met the guy. How can you tell?
I would shrug. I just know, I would say. I look in their eyes, and I know. Because I was right more than I was wrong, I put unwavering trust in my first impressions.
Then something strange began to happen. People started to escape from their files, revealing themselves as more than the one-dimensional paper cut-outs I had so neatly identified.
I remember the first time this occurred. A young man at the newspaper where I worked was promoted to section editor, a post I coveted. He was several years my junior, and he was large and loud and laughed at his own jokes. I had him catalogued under Mediocre-Frat-Boy.
We treated each other with careful courtesy. He kept his hands off my copy, and I kept my disdain under wraps. When he made changes in the section to attract younger readers, I refrained from telling him it was a huge mistake.
To my amazement, his ideas worked. Readers liked the new look and called to tell us so. We won an award or two. Circulation inched upwards.
He didn’t gloat or take bows. He plugged away, coming early, staying late. One night, he was still there at 11 when I returned to file a theater review. We talked until past midnight, sharing newspaper war stories. In the deserted newsroom, he seemed a quieter, more thoughtful version of himself. He laughed at my jokes. I found myself laughing out loud at his.
He stayed another year. By the time he left for a paper out west, he had changed more than the features section. He was no longer a frat boy, and I was no longer infallible. When I got his job, it was his easygoing example I tried to follow.
But life lessons come slowly. Moving on to another post in another place, I was assigned a project with a woman I’d filed under Smug-and-Superior from day one. We finished the work, but maintained an icy distance. Beyond brief nods in the hallway, we barely spoke for several years. One thing seemed clear: she was exactly who I thought she was.
Then, unexpectedly, a thaw ensued. She became a mother, and the sharp edges seemed to soften. The brief nods became hellos, and then little corridor conversations about teething and daycare. She was, I discovered, very funny. Thrown together on another project, we pooled our respective talents and came up with a winner.
We never spoke of the rocky start, and I never told her about my first-impression filing system. It seemed irrelevant, somehow, in the light of our marathon chats and shared confidences. My judgment had proved faulty once again, and once again, I was richer for it.
I work in the city now, on a street that once looked like a case study of urban decay. Today, abandoned buildings have become art galleries, businesses, and trendy lofts. Dark spaces are full of light. At lunchtime, I choose between sushi and deli.
Once I said this would never happen here. Once I said this would never be a real city, not like the cities I knew. Once I believed in neatly labeled file folders, infallible intuition, and the accuracy of first impressions. Now, late in the game and with many a false start, I have come to believe in something else. It’s called possibility.
VARDATE
© 2004 Metro Pulse
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