PART TWO: THE GAME

In October 1980, I had had one year of college behind me and I had embarked on a plan to see what the working world could offer me: I did not have enough money for my post-secondary education and I did not know what I wanted as my major area of study. At the age of nineteen, I began working part time at Eaton's department store in Abbotsford, British Columbia in a Shopping Centre, which is called Seven Oaks. I worked in Shipping and Receiving and then in various departments until May of 1981.

In that era of the workings of Eaton's department store, each employee usually had two managers. One manager was the floor manager or department manager, who was usually called the sales manager. The other manager was one's Personnel Manager, who would now be called a Human Resource(s) Manager. This Personnel Manager was often like an iron-fisted power lord or power broker of ability. If an employee wanted to apply for another position within Eaton's, he or she had to go to his or her Personnel Manager. All advancement within the company went through these personnel managers. These managers made or broke the employees. Some of these managers were nice and some were absolute controllers. Unknown to me during my time at the Seven Oaks Eaton's store, my personnel manager had her sights on me for a better position, possibly management. She did not tell me and would not hire me until I dated or bedded a female employee. I did not know this and I did not have enough money to go on a date. Moreover, I was shy. To make matters worse over the course of this period of time, the two women, on whom I had a crush, were actually a little shy of me. Eventually, I always managed to ask out or talk to the women, whom I liked, but it never worked out and it did not work out this time, either.

In June 1980, I walked into my Personnel Manager's office and asked for full-time employment. I was hired as a Stock Clerk at the Vancouver Pacific Centre Eaton's store within about two weeks of that conversation. I was Stock Clerk of the Cosmetics department and the Drug department. The focus of my job was the Cosmetic department. At Christmas, about three million dollars of merchandise went through my hands. It was a busy job. I enjoyed it. Fifty-five cosmeticians worked in the department and we all got along very well.

When I arrived in the downtown Vancouver store, my Personnel Manager was an older, very mature woman, whose name was Hazel Rogers: we got along very well and she helped me immensely. Hazel Rogers was a fantastic person and she helped me immensely. About a year after I started at that Vancouver store, my Personnel Manager retired and she was replaced with a younger woman with a highly manipulative manner. This was the beginning of trouble for me.

Up until 1983, I was making just over eight dollars an hour. This was not a bad wage, but most of my peers were nearly at a rate that was close to double that of mine. My fellow employees all thought that I was making fifteen dollars an hour and it would appear that my new Personnel Manager had implied that I was making fifteen dollars an hour. I later learned that this new Personnel Manager wanted to get me into bed and that she was determined that I should not get a promotion or a higher wage until I had gone to bed with her or played her game of cat and mouse with another female employee. I was not allowed to try to date more than one female employee in the store and I was not allowed to date anyone in the store at a time that I decided on. My new Personnel Manager, who was called Sharon Turton, orchestrated everything. As I say, this was all done behind my back. I had no knowledge of it. Sharon Turton also started to defame my character. She said that I was a homosexual, a pedophile, or a sexual tease or gigolo. I learned of this long after.

In about April 1983, the Eaton's family decided to decentralize its operations and consolidate many of its functions to Toronto, Canada. To me, this seemed more like centralization. They demoted many of their buyer/sales managers to mere sales managers. They laid off hundreds of managers across Canada. Some had forty years of service. One whole building close to Montreal, where around one thousand Eaton's employees worked, was shut down instantly. The employees in this building rioted and refused to leave for about three days. Anyone caught speaking to the media about the situation at Eaton's was dismissed immediately. Many managers were told that their positions had been done away with and they were offered another lower position. My job as stock clerk was offered to a buyer and I was given two weeks notice. In essence, I had lost my job. Just a little over a week after being given my notice, I was told that the buyer, who had been offered my position, had refused it and I was told that I could keep my job.

I stayed on, but I lost all interest in my job and Eaton's. I resolved to go to university that next September.

Some time around this point, I was verbally accosted by three managers, whom I did not know. They told me that any idea I had while I was employed at Eaton's was the property of Eaton's. I informed them that my ideas were my property. They got very angry with me and said that they would beat the ideas out of me and they would kill me, if they had to. I wished them good luck and that was the end of the conversation.
About two weeks later, a memorandum was circulated to the staff. We were told that we had to give all our ideas to Eaton's. Within a few months, this memorandum was rescinded.

Before, I went to university, I got up enough nerve to ask two women, to whom I was really attracted, to go for coffee with me. The relationships never did go anywhere, but I succeeded in asking them out.

Twice before I went to university in September 1983, two different female employees at Eaton's became attracted to me and went to Labour Canada, which was the federal Canadian agency helping employees with disputes, about me and my ill-treatment at Eaton's. These two women wanted to date me and wanted me to get the promotion that was being dangled at me behind my back. My parents were aware of all this, but they did not tell me or help me. One of these two women was a sales manager. These two women managed to get my situation into court, but I was never told and so I lost my case and the chance to date the women. They would have been dismissed, if they had talked to me or dated me.

Before I went to university, the management at Eaton's found out about my intentions of going to university. Behind my back, they promised to pay for my education, if I went in for a Masters in Business Administration. The management at Eaton's never once approached me about this or about a possible promotion within the company.

There was one occurrence worth mentioning. Every morning at about 8:30, I would head up to the Drug department and stock the tissues on the floor shelves. The store manager, Mr. Bill McCourt, would come walking up the escalator. He said hello to me every morning. This one particular morning, the president of Eaton's, Mr. Frederick Eaton, was in our store. This meant that Mr. McCourt's schedule was different. These two men came out of the Personnel office door. Mr. McCourt said my name and said that Sharon Turton was being mean to me. The president of Eaton's replied that any of his employees could do anything he or she wanted to do as long as that employee was not caught. He told Mr. McCourt that he did not want to talk about my situation anymore and he threatened Mr. McCourt's job security. I realized that my job did not mean anything and I knew that I had to quit Eaton's. I still did not know what Sharon Turton was doing to me.

I went to early registration in August 1983 and left for university in September 1983.