| When
I entered corporate life, I resolved to keep my writing secret.
There was no advantage in being known as the company poet. For nearly
a decade I succeeded in keeping my double life hidden from my co-workers.
Whenever something of mine appeared in The New Yorker, I
would discreetly buy all five copies in the company shop, mail one
to my parents, and slip the others into the bottom of the finance
department's bulging recycling bin.
There
was little chance of my colleagues seeing the other journals in
which I published, although once a brainy summer intern asked if
I had written an article he had seen in The Hudson Review.
"My brother recently wrote something for them," I replied not untruthfully
and quickly changed the subject.
In
1984, however, Esquire permanently blew my cover when I was
featured in the first "Esquire Register of Men and Women
Under Forty Who Are Changing America." Someone brought a copy of
the issue into the office and passed it around. Had it been merely
a literary honor, no one would have noticed, but here was the name
of a General Foods executive on a list with really important people
like Julius "Doctor J." Erving, Whoopi Goldberg, Dale Murphy, and
Steven Spielberg.
At
that time I worked for the most macho boss in the company, an Annapolis
graduate, All-American athlete, and former commanding officer of
combat longshoremen (the lucky guys who unload military supplies
under enemy fire). He was a brilliant, hot-tempered, fellow who
didn't waste words. For example, he addressed his close associates
only by their initials. I was summoned by a secretary to his office
where he sat smoking a cigar butt. He motioned me to come closer.
"D.G.,
someone told me you wrote poetry."
"Yeah,
Greg," I replied. "I do."
He
took the greasy stub out of his mouth, ground it into the ashtray,
and whispered, not unkindly, only one word, "Shit."
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