My name is Steve and I had to tell someone this story:
I'm a field service engineer in charge of trouble-shooting major accounts in the northern parts of the US. I live in and work out of Minneapolis. When I got an invitation to attend a major convention in Miami, in January, I was really tickled.
I had been freezing my balls off up there and getting to go to Miami for a week, even if I had to be working the convention booth, was a wonderful break. Sunday night was arrivals for our team and we had a group meeting where we got introduced to each other, got our assignments and did the rest of the nuts and bolt stuff that goes with working a major show like this. Our crew came from all over the country and included some heavy hitters from sales, marketing, research and tech support. I knew some of the people from my years in my position and some of the others I knew from reputation or from our teleconferences that we did occasionally. I knew one of the 4 women there with us, Bonnie, from working with her via the teleconference route on a couple of problem accounts. I'd never seen her "live" until now. She had always been sitting at a conference table when the camera was "on" and she was not quite as I had imagined her when I finally saw her.
Bonnie was in flat shoes and still must have been almost six feet tall. She was wearing a conservative travel outfit that barely suggested her femininity but something about her had my senses twitching. Being about 6'2" myself, I have always preferred big, athletic women. She was wearing very little make-up and really didn't need any, in my opinion. Her hair was fairly short and curly but business-like and she carried herself with a lot of confidence. I was trying like hell not to stare at her and be a "pro," too.
Monday was very busy as we were sweating to get the large booth set up and prepped for the opening evening event. There was swearing, hammering and crisis management activities as the details had to come together to make this ready to go. When we finished with the booth we all ran to our rooms to get out of construction clothes and into business suits for the two hours we had to do that night.
The doors opened on time and we braced ourselves for the 2,000 plus attendees that always swarm the exhibit floor on the first night. Tonight was supposed to be just a "teaser" to let the techs and supervisors have a peek at all the equipment we had brought with us. It was an incredibly hectic two hours that stretched into almost 4 hours by the time the room cleared out and we cleaned up to be ready for the next time.
Tuesday morning was a golf outing and we had reserved 4 carts to pair our golfers up with clients we wanted to get closer to. My guy from Buffalo never showed up. I think he missed his flight because of weather. I was sitting in my cart when Bonnie walked up. She was carrying a lightweight travel golf bag filled with Ping irons, Callaway woods and looked like she knew what to do with them. She explained that she hadn't really signed up for our little outing because she hadn't thought she wouldn't have time, but things opened up and here she was. The other carts were full and when I told her my story about the MIA from Buffalo, she asked if I would mind letting a "girl play with me?" I don't know if a double entrendre was meant, but I almost choked and said "That would be just fine."
I was noticed a few things about her: She was forty-something years old, I'd guess, and looked very nice dressed in a golf shirt and shorts. She had a big smile when you could make her grin; and now that I could get a good look at her in casual clothes, I could tell she had a pretty big chest. Finally, at nearly six feet tall, she had legs that went all the way to the ground. Really nice legs.
We were playing a "best ball" format that emphasizes having some fun rather than the pressure of a highly competitive atmosphere. There was one of our marketing guys in the cart ahead of us and he was really working on a lab director who was putting up with the constant chatter. I think he was silently wishing the marketing weenie would drop dead.
Anyway, Bonnie and I were just chatting and hitting as our turns came up. I had said something about how cold it was up north and she had said she was glad to be here to just get away from her regular life for a little while. I said that she sounded very serious and she said the pressure had been pretty high the last couple of months.
Each of us would regularly be the "best ball" and we were having a good time in the great weather. She became our designated putter because anything in the 15' to 20' feet range she just cleaned up. Her drives were usually down the middle of the fairway and about 190 yards long. My drives were a lot longer but often wound up in a different zip code. We were talking about our view of our jobs and I said candidly that I was spending more and more time cleaning up the bull shit that sales created. Bonnie gave me a high-five and said:
"I spend most of my day trying to keep the corporation from going to jail because of stupid, fucking "tweaks" that marketing tries to put through after the product has been approved and launched."
I was kind of stunned that she would say "fucking" but I got the point that she was very passionate about her work and the level of responsibility she had. After we had broken "the F word barrier", I found out she could swear like a guy and was good at it.
We finished up after almost 5 hours on the course. I told her I had had a great time and hoped we would meet sometime during the rest of the week. She said she enjoyed it, too, but said she was committed for dinner that night with a hospital manager and a couple of the other "big guys".
Wednesday was grueling. The doors to the exhibition floor opened at 10:00am and the work really began for us. You had to be on your feet, working the crowd all the time. The level of technical expertise varied greatly among the attendees and you never knew when some PhD. was going to appear and need info for some research paper he was doing.