You can run but you can never hide

Few of you know this about me, but in a past life, I sold knives. Okay, it wasn’t so much in a past life as it was during my teens (which does feel like another life at times…thank goodness!). But the knife selling part remains true, a slight blemish on my otherwise saintly existence (as my parents emit a snort of amused skepticism). It was the summer of my seventeenth birthday, and hungry for independence (and more importantly pocket money), I decided to look for a job. My friend Marc-Antoine who had worked at a placed called Vector Marketing (in retrospect the name itself should have served as a warning) recommended it to me, while also recommending me to the big boss at this said marketing company. So it is that with absolutely no experience under my belt, and what was most probably a bizarre haircolor and style (as my parents emit a sigh of relief that this phase has finally passed), I headed for my first interview. I don’t remember how it went exactly, but I guess I didn’t too badly since I ended up getting the job (mind you, I would realize subsequently that pretty much anyone capable of doing the penny-cutting demonstration (yes, our scissors were that strong!) stood a significant chance of being hired at Vector Marketing).

And so it is that there and then, I became the newest bright-eyed and bushy-tailed Cutco knife salesperson on the block. As the oracle (aka my mother) had forewarned, Vector Marketing turned out to be a lot more like a cult or a pyramidal scheme than it was a marketing company… It came complete with a philosophy centered on motivational posters (the kind that feature people reaching the top of a really high mountain just as the sun rises), monthly motivational sales meeting in Cornwall, Ontario, and recruitment of potential clients through personal connections and snowballing (or door-to-door harassment for the more ambitious ones). Oh and you had to buy your own demonstration kits too and supply your own pennies to cut through for the demonstrative climax.

Basically, as a Vector Marketer, I went around with my kit under my arm and visited family, neighbors, my friends’ mothers and my mother’s friends to share with them the magic of Cutco kitchen, sewing and/or fishing and hunting knives. There were different sets, different colors of non-rusting allied-metal cutting tools, sold exclusively through Vector and varied enough to satisfy the modern day woman who no longer has hours to spend chopping up vegetables for the evening stew, the avid boar hunter or anyone inclined to want to cut pennies with a pair of scissors (let me tell you it’s a pretty popular party trick…especially after a few martinis). Basically, Cutco offered a knife for everyone in the family, from little cousin Timmy to Aunt Matilda to old Grandpa Bubba. And to ensure continued motivation of the troops, Vector marketers were paid on sliding-scale commission whereas the more you sold, the more you earned.

Realizing pretty quickly that I wasn’t cut out (no pun intended!) for this type of career, I ended up cutting (insert drumroll here) my Cutco career pretty short, lasting all of one month. Mind you that month proved enough to require me and a significant number of family members, neighbors, friends’ mothers and mother’s friends to receive medical attention for cuts of varied intensity (those knives were sharp and I have the bagel-cutting scar to prove it…which, by the way, required six stitches). Having disliked pretty much every moment of my Vector Marketing experience, it was with an incredible amount of relief that I gave my resignation to our head knife-guru and closed that chapter in my life. There were recurring nightmares and periods of high anxiety, but after a few years I finally managed to make my peace and let it go.

Until yesterday, that is. I had come to meet an amazing American HIV/AIDS activist/educationalist/researcher at his home in a suburb of Accra, and after a lengthy chat, ended up being invited for supper with his partner and their son. As we were putting away the dishes in the kitchen, I saw something that made my blood run cold. There, tucked away on the counter stood a block of wood with the Cutco label proudly emblazoned into it, seven of those familiar knife handles sticking out inconspicuously (I would recognize them for miles…after all, I’ve been using the knives from my demo kit for the past 10 years!)

I’m not sure what it means and how it came to be, but somehow, Cutco knives had managed to follow me all the way to Accra. Stumbling upon these mementos of a not-so-distant past I wanted to forget, I produced a small screech, and asked my gracious hosts how they had come about these damned objects. It turns out that their nephew—bless his soul—was also indoctrinated into the Church of Cutco, and apparently brought a few family members down with him. They too cut themselves and bled bitter Cutco blood in their kitchens, and it is with a few tears in our eyes that we showed off our war-wounds and exchanged battle stories. It was painful, but ultimately cathartic, as facing a past trauma often is. I guess it’s true what they say, you can run from your past, but you can never really hide from it.

Now how can I possibly follow up this anecdote (quite reminiscent of a Seinfeld episode might I add…whereas essentially, it’s a blog about nothing). Well I guess by letting y’all know that things are and continue to be well. Research is coming along wonderfully and I’m getting pretty excited at the idea of coming home, digesting the experience and writing up my dissertation (once a geek, always a geek). I’ve been spending some quality time with my peeps, and even finding a bit of down time here and there to indulge my newest addiction to Harlequin novels (and I’ve totally cracked the code such that I feel ready to become a romance novel writer if things don’t work out too well with the whole PhD thing). I’m really sad to see my time in Ghana running out, but also really really excited at the idea of coming home, seeing my beloved family and friends again and walking in the streets of my beautiful Montreal with a latte in my hands (as lattes are the only items that I’ve truly really missed when it comes to edible/drinkable stuff). But there are still four weeks left before the regal return of the Baboon Queen to her kingdom and faithful hominid subjects…and a busy four weeks it promises to be, with lots of research tidbits to finish up, goodbyes to make, social shindigs to attend and to organize and of course, [insert valley-girl accent here] shopping to do! I will miss Ghana terribly, but I am also pretty sure that I’ll be coming back here sooner than later. After all, if the Cutco incident has taught me anything, it’s that nothing is really ever over for good in this life… there’s always room for an epilogue.

I miss you all my lovelies.
Philosophically yours,
Sophie

Ps: J’ai hate de vous revoir mes poulets!!!!!!