Men at Work "It's a Mistake"

You mean you've never been thrown out of your company's holiday party?

While working as a board operator at a radio station just a few weeks after surviving a format flip, I happily RSVP'd to the company party which was held at a some fancy pants club in Chicago's River North neighborhood. I was just 19 years old and only worked Sunday mornings from 6-9am, so the number of people I knew (and who knew me) was limited -- especially since most of the people who hired me got fired when the station was sold and the format flipped. That night at the party, I surrounded myself with the handful of on-air folks who also survived the mass firings. My girlfriend, Missy, loved to dance and made a name for herself at the previous year's party when she danced up a storm (while wearing a teeny-tiny dress). She even studied dance at Butler University at the time. I, on the other hand, didn't like to dance and only did it to appease her. Unlike the previous year's party, this party featured a vacant dance floor. Absolutely NO ONE was dancing. As the DJ played song after song, the empty dance floor continued to call Missy's name. Despite her pleas, I held firm that we would not touch that dance floor until someone else made their way onto it.

After the Chicago market manager finished his "we're all one big happy family" speech to the three radio stations celebrating together in that club, two women made their way to the dance floor. Missy seized the opportunity and grabbed my hand as we made our way to dance to the Bee Gee's "Stayin' Alive". This was moment I noticed that all eyes were on us. Those two other ladies (who broke the dance floor's virginity) left the floor.

About five short minutes after we returned to our seats, a security guard tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I had a business card. My first thought was: "Wow! Maybe someone wants to give me a job!". Nope. The security guard wanted to know if I had any proof that I worked for the company. Suddenly, no one was offering me a job but instead wanted proof that I had a job. The security guard kept saying "she wants to know:, so I asked who this infamous "she" was. He walked me through the crowded room and to an angry-looking woman who stood a short distance from us. With her eyes fixed on me, she blurted out: "Who are you? Who do you work for?" I shared an audio version of my resume and her face went pale. "Oh," she said, "I recognized your name, but not your face. In fact, no one knew who you were. I thought you crashed our party."

With the warmth of the market manager's "we're all family now" speech now fully evaporated, I returned to my seat and informed Missy we had danced our last dance of the evening. Suddenly, I was famous for all the wrong reasons. Everyone seemed to find the story amusing, but I felt like an insignificant cog in this giant radio machine. Our station's General Manager later made his way over to me and apologized that the lady (who was part of Human Resources) tried to kick me out of the party. He shook my hand and handed me an envelope containing my Christmas bonus while insisting that I keep on having fun.

Culture Club "Karma Chameleon"

After agreeing to attend my first high school dance, the frightening reality hit me: I had no idea how to dance. Known as "Turnabout" at most schools (where the the girl asks out the boy), our school simply labeled the dance "Winter Formal". Easy enough, right? My friend, Mandy, invited me to the dance in November--providing me two solid months to figure out what the heck to do once I stepped foot on the dance floor. Most afternoons that winter, I escaped to the basement right after school and tuned on Chicago's B-96 (which labeled itself "Chicago's Dance Beat" back in those days) on my dad's stereo. The Winter Formal DJ was bound to play songs that were popular on the radio and I reasoned this gave me a chance to practice. A full-length mirror hung in our basement allowing me to take inventory of how stupid I looked while dancing. My goals were modest: find and master one move and stick with it.

Donning a rented tuxedo for the first time in my life, I stood among a houseful of camera-toting family members while awaiting my date and ride  as I was still only 15 years old. After endless "look over here" and "say cheeseburger" comments from my family, my brother failed to make good on his threat to drop a condom as I walked out the door. Thank goodness. That evening, I somehow wound up in a group of folks who were more popular (read: more attractive) than me and yet felt an awkward sense of calm. Since we were all sophomores, the majority of the couples had split up long before the dance but soldiered on as they likely didn't want to blow money on tuxedos and dresses for naught. Most of the guys in the group sat at our table with their arms folded while the girls danced with one another. Since Mandy and I were friends, there was no pressure or awkwardness like one would feel at prom because no matter what happened that night, Mandy's dad was driving me home.

For the majority of the evening, I danced. One could label my sole dance move "the snow ski" but, hey, I danced. In fact, I danced enough that other girls at my table complained to their indifferent ex-boyfriends that they should also be dancing with them. It didn't work. The majority of the guys had chips on their shoulders that refused to budge. Despite my practicing to B-96's dance music, the DJ mostly stuck to a vanilla playlist of tunes similar to what one would hear at a wedding reception. "YMCA", "The Electric Slide", "Shook Me All Night Long" played and, at one point, the DJ announced he was making good on a request for "Karma Chameleon". Weird. All told, I had a great time and (for whatever reason) didn't talk to Mandy much afterwards. It wasn't that we parted on bad terms, I just moved on and rarely talked to her again. Guilt would eventually get to me and later led to one of the more awkward phone calls of my teen life. Stay tuned for that story.