It was a rough day on the phones today. No sooner would I attempt to hang up my phone, then it would be off and ringing again, two calls coming in at one time.

I am convinced, that too many people knowing your name, can be a bad thing. Popularity, after all, can be a bitch.

At first you think it's great that so many people prefer to talk to you, and only you. It hypes you up.

You begin to see yourself as a supersalesperson, clowning around striking your superhero pose, as you proclaim to your office that another crisis was averted thanks to, (ta tum tee da dum trumpet fanfare) Super Salesgirl! That is, until you realize that every positive has its own negative.

Suddenly, you spend your days trapped to your phone, because customers will wait as long as it takes, to get you on the line and stoutly refuse to speak to anyone else.

You begin to define the word "team" as an army of one, because your compatriots in the sales department, decide that leaving their own phones off the hook, is the new wave of customer service. So you do your best, giving even better customer service to the call that's been on hold for half an eternity, to prove that there is someone still in the office that cares.

So you put that smile in your voice and handle call, after call, after call, with as much enthusiam as you can muster. All the while secretly planning a duct tape attack, on your office mate next door. Visions of them strapped into their chairs, with their headphones surgically attached to their head get you through the day.

Order after order, comes flying into your office, via phone and via fax, and it's all you can do, to keep up with the jobs needing to be done for that day.

With nose to the grindstone, you meticulously proof each and every order, inbetween calls and calculations, correcting errors when they arise, until you're finally faxing off the finished order confirmation, taking an extra kind moment of consideration to scrawl, "Attention: Joe Order" , so the right guy gets it at the other end.

When problems occur, you handle it, becoming the go to girl when shit goes wrong. You contact your outside reps, providing a brief play by play of the situation, always the customers advocate, until you find the resolution that works.

You believe that excellent customer service, should not be an option, even if it means having to eat a little crow once in a while and take one for the team. Fixing the problem and righting the wrong, makes you an angel in the customer's eyes, and if he didn't think so before, you've reached wonderful by the time the call comes to its close.

Wonderful however, is not wonderful ... It means you've just made a conquest of yet another customer, and soon your name, will be the only one he'll remember.

You realize you're screwed.

Getting out on time becomes a thing of the past. Although you said it wouldn't happen again, flashbacks of this time last year, come back to haunt you. You shake your head, trying to clear the memory of early mornings that lasted late until evening, as you were always the first one in and the very last to go home.

Your personal life took a nose dive, your job becoming like a husband you felt forced to please. You didn't know how to do it any other way. Once accustomed, customers had expectations, you felt forced to meet.

So you gave up your lunch hour, in order to keep up with the workload. Convincing yourself that you could be proud of your job without having to become the job, and the sacrifices you made would pay off in the end.

Still, there were days when gaving 100% didn't seem like much at all. Not with the little seed of supersalesperson still wanting to sprout inside.

Until today.

4:32 and my phone was still ringing despite the time. It didn't seem to matter to anyone, that my shift was offically over at 4:30, and I was already two minutes late, to getting the hell out of there.

It irked me, because the receptionist kept slinging calls into my room and paging me over the intercom, when she was more than well aware, that both Toni and I, were working early shift.

I looked at my phone, watching the green lights flashing furiously, in the attempt to alert me to the two calls ringing into my room. I stood there, weighing my choices, but knew that if I picked up the phone, it was sure to be a problem on the other end and one that would keep me there way past the time I was meant to go.

I hemmed for a moment, and the I hawwed. But what I did, still amazes me.

"No! Not today!" said the little voice in my head, "Not on KC's first day of school, is there any way, I am going to stay over and miss all the details of how her first day went! I'm going home, and I'm going home now!"

So I packed up my things, grabbed my purse and keys and made my way to the time clock, walking by a shocked receptionist holding a phone in her hand saying, "But Stacey, it's for you ..."

I suppose I could have stopped and reminded her that had I left on time, I would have already been half way home, but it seemed a moot point.

Instead, I gave her a bit of friendly advice, even as I was walking out the door not bothering to look back.

"Put it in my voicemail ... or give them someone else. I'm going home."