And Another Thing

who mind their

B BUSINESS

What I know about business and the business world you could put in a hollow pecan shell and have room left over for a cashew. I know even less about women. But any male or female being honest would understand that the females featured in this month’s SB Magazine have earned their recognition and our thanks as their neighbors for taking well-thought-out risks, for persevering, for believing, for getting up early and staying up late when the day or night demanded, and for building businesses that make our twin cities and our area better. All across the business spectrum, they shine. No job too big or too small. No challenge that can’t be met with some want-to, elbow grease, and cool, calculated thinking. Decades ago, a popular advertisement was Virginia Slims and “You’ve got your own cigarette now, baby. You’ve come a long, long way.” But wasn’t having “your own cigarette” setting the bar kind of low? The decades since say yes. Now “you’ve” got your own corporation, your own hours, your own portfolio, your own employees, your own business suit closet and your own bikini drawer. Who says you have to give up one for the other? We’ve all come a long, long way. Thank goodness. Back in those late-1960s, early-’70s Virginia Slims days, there were few female business owners in my little Carolina hometown. Mrs. Kay ran Kay’s Hair Here. Mrs. Ernestine presided over her backyard Little Red Schoolhouse. That was about it. Then again, there were few business owners at all. Most business owners were called “farmers.” And all of them had wives, and none of the husbands outworked the women — and these were hard-working men. I’ve seen up close who really kept the wheels turning, kept the family machinery going, and it wasn’t the guys in khaki pants and Penzoil caps, as wonderful as they all were. Most everyone in my professional world today is my boss. Of my five immediate bosses, three are girl bosses, including at SB. (Hello, Elizabeth!) They feel and see things differently, in a good sense, from the way I’m wired. I’m not saying the girls are better bosses than the boys, but they sure aren’t worse strictly because of gender. They smell a lot better, I’ll tell you that…

Most things considered, it’s confounding that the question of which gender is the “weaker sex” remains up for discussion. My team retired that trophy a long, long time ago. Females are better at navigating, conversating, calculating, laminating, legislating, and procreating, an area in which we are woefully inadequate. As this issue suggests, it’s not a fair fight anymore. Which is fine. I sort of like being Number 2. (Wait … did that come out wrong?) Harder still to understand why women would have anything to do with us at all. We are, after all, only guys. Which isn't saying much. Early on I learned a hard lesson: guys mean playtime, girls mean business. It was on the Lake View Elementary playground where Cathy Sims, Southern country cute around age 8, kicked me in the shin with her pointy-toe black cowboy boot for a reason I can’t remember. I can remember the pain and the eggplant-colored bruise. So it figures that in 7th grade she would become my girlfriend, the only one I ever had in pre-teen years, and that was for only a few kick-free weeks. Naturally, I’d thought things were going well. Sigh … this was only the beginning of a long and painful education in the ways of the boy-girl world. Women should have the spotlight. They deserve it. They’ve earned it. We guys are rhythm guitar and background vocals, if not the roadies. You need roadies to have a show, but no one’s BY TEDDY ALLEN going to buy a ticket to see you set up the stage. Good roadies understand their place and work with their heads down. Long after the Cathy Sims Incident, it became obvious not only that girls mean business, but also that girls grow into women. Thank goodness they do. And to you, we say this: No matter your occupation, thank you for taking care of business and, sincerely, thank you for taking care of us, the Number 2s. We can sure use the help. Teddy Allen is an award-winning columnist and graduate of Louisiana Tech, where he works as a writer and broadcaster.