When Your New Male Boss Calls You a “Girl” But You Are Actually a 38-Year Old Senior Copywriter with Time to Kill

Use all-caps to show excitement and work-context appropriateness.

Photo by Allyssa Olaivar on Unsplash.

1. Immediately change your Slack profile pic to a cartoon vagina. Ensure it’s pink, as he may not have seen one before and may need traditionally gendered colors to fire up the neurons.
2. Speaking of the color pink, during yearly planning and goal-setting take the opportunity to insist that on Wednesdays, we wear pink.
3. Update all meetings including women to be titled, “GIRLS’ NIGHT OUT.” Since everyone is in different time zones, it’s going to be 5 o’clock (and 1 a.m.) somewhere. The odds are obviously good that one of the ladies is making Cosmos. Use all-caps to show excitement and work-context appropriateness.
4. It’s 2023, so don’t be afraid to get with the kids and casually sprinkle the pink bow emoji in your projects, presentations, etc., Especially ensure this is actioned if the work involves Fortune 500 companies or men over 50.
5. Miss important meetings and deadlines whenever you want to run to Taco Bell and explain it is “that time of the month.” Feel free to just use #SharkWeek in email and rescheduling threads for maximum effect.
6. Ask for a pay raise. Not only are you likely making $.80 to his dollar, but you can now claim the other well-known fact that “women be shopping!”
7. Send a company-wide email announcing that the entire marketing department will be referred to as the “Girl Gang” from here on out. Use company card to print glitter t-shirts on Zazzle.
8. Every Monday, ask if he and the other boys caught the game or got up to any sweet DIY projects in the man-cave this weekend.
9. Wonder aloud if we should refer to the CEO of the company as a “Girl Boss” from now on.
10. Casually suggest he refer to the number of books that are specifically about collective nouns. Such as A Dazzle of Flamboyance, A Murmuration of Starlings, and An Ambush of Tigers. May he, like the 5- to 7-year-olds these books are intended for, discover that language has immense power.

Katy Luxem is a writer and pickleball enthusiast living in Salt Lake City. She is a graduate of the University of Washington and has a master’s from the University of Utah. Her work has appeared in Rattle, McSweeney’s, SWWIM Every Day, Poetry Online, and others. She is the author of Until It Is True (Kelsay Books, 2023). Find her on Instagram @katyluxem or at www.katyluxem.com.