Partying with the Freakiest of the Geeks

Last night, Raider's company, FluidHost, threw its annual open-bar riverboat party for employees. We've been going to this party for enough years now--this, and the super-elegant holiday party they throw in December--that I have friends there that I am always happy to see.

There is a relatively small tech sector here in mid-Michigan, and as a result, Raider and some of his co-workers have been crossing paths for years.The new project manager, for instance, used to work with Raider back at Tiny Internet Provider a decade ago, before it went under. Raider's boss at FluidHost interviewed at TIP at the same time Raider did but didn't get a job; the new project manager was offered a job at FluidHost five years ago, when Raider got hired on, but opted to go to work for the other tech company in town, CodeCrafters, instead. And so on.

So, they were talking about the corporate culture at CodeCrafters versus FluidHost, and the new PM was saying that CodeCrafters was just that little bit more buttoned-down. FluidHost has lots of guys like Raider--fairly ordinary-looking guys who don't stand out as a "type" until you see a bunch of them together and can only tell them apart by subtle variations in facial hair ("Look!" one of the other wives and I said to each other. "They're stroking their beards in exactly the same way! Isn't it adorable?")

But there's also a sizeable contingent of people who would stand out anywhere they went: a nice lesbian with pink hair, some visibly trans people, men with long hair and dramatic beards, people with gauged piercings and dramatic tattoos, goths, sexy fat women in scarlet corsets.

Watching a crowd waiting to embark during one of the boat's stops at the dock, the new project manager said, "You just don't see this diversity at CodeCrafters."

Raider said, "Yes, FluidHost gets the freakiest of the geeks."

The simple explanation is that most of the people who work at FluidHost are not software engineers like Raider and his team. They are tech support, working around the clock on the phone. The kind of job that is perfect for freaky smart people. I love the freaky smart people. I feel at home among them.

Raider and his cohort are much of a type: super-smart but taciturn and introverted, with a dry wit. They read science fiction and relax by playing Red Dead Redemption and Halo 3: ODST. Their passion for their smartphones is almost adulterous. To a man, they are possessed of colorful vivacious wives who do the social heavy-lifting for them. Last night, the other DevTeam wives and I were joking that we are such a stereotyped bunch that it's like there are factories producing us somewhere: one assembly line putting together guys, the final step being to outfit them in relaxed-fit jeans, dirty sneakers, and a t-shirt that says, "There are only 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't."

On the other assembly line, a line of women who start chattering as soon as their heads are attached. They're dressed in bright pink with sequins, or black skirts chosen for their "twirl factor." It is hard to keep them separated so they can be packaged with their mates; they keep clumping up together to admire each other's shoes, laugh about child-rearing, and make affectionate jokes about the men they love.

By 8:30, the wives are on the dance floor. The husbands do not dance. With one exception, the Young Genius, who takes to the floor for one song with his Beautiful Wife, flinging himself around the floor and twirling her with a dorky abandon that the wives find charming and that causes us to cast hopeful glances at our own gentlemen. The husbands chatter more during this song that they have all evening: "Look at the Young Genius!" they say to each other. "He looks ridiculous! I will never go out there to make a fool of myself like him."

The wives sigh. And when the next song starts, we flood the dance floor again, together. Sometimes we are joined by one or two of the nice lesbians, though the sweet young butch who danced with me last year has, alas, moved on to greener pastures. It is a dance party so completely female that we might be back in high school, having a sleepover. Perhaps later we will give each other facials and try out dramatic new makeup looks.

A song comes on that stops everyone dead. "I don't know this song," the Young Genius's Beautiful Wife says. The others shake their heads and frown; they don't know it either.

Only I am still dancing, bopping around the floor singing, "I always feel like...somebody's watching me. And I got no privacy. Wo-o-o."

They look at me.

I shrug. "It's from when I was in high school."

The Beautiful Wife asks, "When were you in high school?"

I say, "Um, 79 to 83."

She says, "Teach me how to dance to it."

So I try to, explaning that it's all vertical, no butt and hips, all bouncing and arms and little girly kicks. Basically I am trying to teach her Molly Ringwald's moves from The Breakfast Club.

She almost gets it. But the effort nearly kills me. All that bouncing is hard on the knees at 46, and of course, my orthopedic sneakers are like anvils with magna-grip soles. After only a few minutes, I can barely breathe.

I love that she is game to try it. I collapse back at our table to drink a big glass of water and catch my breath, but the Beautiful Wife just keeps dancing.

Some final moments from the evening:

The New Guy's wife tells a story. Apparently, he came home from his interview dejected. "They took me out to lunch," he said, "but I don't think they liked me. Nobody said anything."

She told him, "They liked you. They will hire you because you will fit right in."

She was, of course, right.

And:

We are watching people arrive, and Raider says, "There's so-and-so and his partner." We sat with them at dinner last year. "His partner?" I say. "Are you sure? He introduced him to me as his friend."

Raider looks at me with pity. "Because we look like a middle-aged straight couple."

Me: "Oh, my god! And I fell for it!"

And:

I spend some time with the Life of the Party wife of Raider's Silent But Sexy co-worker. Life of the Party got me to do my first shots ever two Christmas parties ago. It involved pouring the booze through an elaborate tunnel carved in an ice sculpture, and the drink was called a Buttery Nipple.

Anyway, I score some points with Life of the Party by recognizing her Bettie Page tattoo. I am only able to do this (although I of course know who Bettie Page is) because a few minutes earlier Raider had said, "Hey, is that a Bettie Page tattoo on Life of the Party's calf?" but I don't let on. Turns out Life of the Party collects Bettie Page memorabilia. Beautiful Wife and I comment that we would love to see the Bettie Page memorabilia sometime. "I don't know," Life of the Party says. "It's pretty racy."

Beautiful Wife and I are totally up for racy. This, we think, sounds much better than a FluidHost wives tupperware party.

Eventually, Raider and I sneak away. We find a quiet spot along the rail on the second deck; above us, the drunkest partiers are smoking and being raucus; below us, people are at tables, trying to talk above the music. We're snuggled up as close as we can get, Raider's arm around my waist. We watch the riverbank pass slowly by in the twilight. We see ducks, swallows skimming the water, a kingfisher. We share a hard cider, passing the cold bottle back and forth, and chat quietly. Every now and then, we kiss.

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