Embarassing

When one is in the workplace one attempts to maintain a reputation of poise, professionalism and eloquence. However, there are mitigating circumstances that render that goal impossible. For example, any visible symptom of illness, i.e. sneezing, laryngitis or coughing are all minor infractions. So long as you so long as you cover your face, wash yours hands, use antibacterial and/or refrain from speaking, people will understand and soon forget. Tripping on flat ground is another, but everyone does that at some point so it too is soon forgotten.


It was my dumb luck, however, to find an embarrassing, uncontrollable, incurable way of loosing one's dignity. 


Hiccups.


Today I not only came down with an embarrassing case of the hiccups once, but twice. Upon returning from lunch, I sat in my cubicle and began uncontrollably hiccuping. Some people are lucky enough to be able to stifle such an unflattering body function, but I cannot claim to be one of those people. Short anecdote: One day in high school choir practice, I had the hiccups. There were 200 of us in the choir room and we were preparing for our upcoming concert which was good because the singing camouflaged my inadvertent squeaks. However, right at the moment where everyone was supposed to cut off and remain silent and still, I hiccuped. It was so loud that the entire choir room turned around, looked at me and started laughing. Even the teacher stopped playing piano because she was laughing so hard. So the moral of the story is that I hiccup loudly and, inevitably, at the most inopportune moments.


So I am desperately, yet, subtilely trying to cure my hiccups while I try to meet certain work deadlines for the afternoon.  So as not to draw attention to myself, I attempt to hold my breath while sitting at my desk, typing. However, that only results in lack of oxygen. So I graduate to drinking water. Now this seems like a logical first step, but since I did not want to be engaged in conversation at the water cooler and thus outed by my condition I bumped it to option two and then waited patiently until I knew no one was in the kitchenette. 


Alas, all that effort and no luck. Then came plugging my ears and nose and swallowing three times, which also requires a level of discretion, cause let's be honest, if you came upon someone in their cubicle doing that, wouldn't you think less of them? Still no luck. And the hiccups are beginning to squeak through. I'm sure someone has noticed. I mean, how can you not notice a squeak reverberating through the office and cutting through the white noise of typing and air ventilators?!


Then all at once and without the aid of my ingenious remedies. They're gone! Halleluia! So I go on with my work. 


Less than 30 minutes later they return with a vengeance and I restart my attempts to cure them.


Then out of the corner of my eye I see someone coming over to my cubicle. Damn. He needs to talk about footage from last week so the moment I open my mouth, I hiccup. Loudly. I immediately apologize, but let's be honest the damage is done and is only compounded by the subsequent hiccups that continue through the entire 5 minute conversation. Awesome. 


I have finally decided to refill my drinking glass, because my earlier attempts had drained my supplies, and when I return I settle on my final remedy, drinking water from the opposite side of the glass. This is the culmination of my failed attempts to maintain my dignity marked by squeaks at 45 seconds intervals. I try to hold on the final scrap of respectability as I sit at my desk and bend over to accomplish the feat. And now after 2 hours of hiccups combined with several hits to my professional reputation and a headache, I now have spilled water on myself, but no longer have the hiccups. 


So although no one has directly said anything to me about it, I can hardly believe that everyone was completely ignorant of the occasional squeak coming from my general direction. Alas.