Smelvis Has Left The Building

I heard exciting work gossip today from Queen Bee (*New Character Alert* The 50-something Queen Bee is an accountant who’s been working this office for her entire career. She’s a chain smoking Italian that, bless her soul, never ever stops talking). So, drum roll please... Bertha was fired from her job at the Office Across the Hall! We’d discussed seeing her less and less recently, but after a solid week’s absence, Queen Bee told us that her cousin from the office upstairs told HER that Bertha was shown the door.

Previously, we’d all agreed that Bertha must be brilliant at whatever it is that she does for a living. How else would one get called back after sitting though a job interview smelling like a decomposing animal? Isn’t that a turn off for employers? It may sound discriminatory and juvenile but I think “she smells funny” is a perfectly legitimate reason not to hire someone. And we only encountered her in the hallways, bathroom, and, on one particularly horrible experience that I don’t want to talk about, elevator. Imagine the 9-5 life experienced by those people sitting in her neighboring cubicles. That’s just mean, man.

Whatever she did right to earn a place there, I guess she wasn’t doing it anymore. We have little to remember Bertha by other than her “special soap” that she left after her departure still sitting on the bathroom counter where it’s always been, tagged with a post it reading “Bertha, Office Across the Hall.” I suggested to Bell this morning that we leave the soap there in memoriam. Maybe drop a few flowers next to it on occasion. Light a candle. Make a big tacky sign out of poster board with her picture and the solemn farewell that I’m quite sure my entire office is hearing in their hearts. It might look a little something like this:

Sitting in her old stall this morning, I noticed a lingering, phantom odor that seems to have absorbed into the very fabric of the restroom. As I sat there musing and wrinkling my nose, I felt a sadness over our loss. The role of That Person is integral to the infrastructure of a work environment. We must all have someone to hate on, make fun of, and gossip about. That person is just as important as the Office BFF or the Office Boyfriend or the Office Drunk (yours truly). Without Bertha, we’re left with Freak #2 and a slightly newer addition to the Office Across the Hall, Amy Winehouses’ Doppelganger. Bertha leaves a very large muumuu to fill. Let’s all hope they’re up to the task.