*WWIC is a new initialism – well, new to me, as I’ve just learned about it. It means, “Why Wasn’t I Consulted?”

Here’s a link to the article that introduced this idea to me – don’t ask how I got there, it was a very roundabout route.

It made me think of an event I experienced many years ago that probably changed the course of my life. (By the way, there were also earlier pivotal events, which I wrote about here!)

In 1966 I began working at The Montreal Star, one of our two major English dailies at the time. My goal was to finagle my way into the Editorial Department, where, I hoped, I would be able to regale readers with my well-written, entertaining and intriguing lifestyle articles. 

Well, no such opening existed then, so I took what I could get – starting in the typing pool in the Accounts Department… for $55 a week. Look, it was a time when you could buy a comic book for 10¢ and a cup of coffee for 35¢ or so. Anyway, it was much better than my first job in 1962, which paid me $35 weekly! 

After a couple of years, I was promoted to Accounts Receivable, where my main duties involved phoning and nudging clients who were delinquent in paying for their advertising. I guess they liked my gentle telephone technique, because they usually soon paid what they owed.

So where does “WWIC” come in? Well, one day when I entered the department and walked over to my desk, I immediately saw something missing: one of my ledgers was gone. I asked my nearest colleague who just shrugged. Next, another of my peers was promoted to a different department; I told myself it was probably because she was fully bilingual, French/English, whereas my French was weak. But the next day, all my ledgers were gone – the lists of customers and their accounts, no longer taking up a third of my desk! Where were they?! This time I asked my supervisor. Normally I found him intimidating, but this needed a good explanation!

“What – what happened to my ledgers?” I asked him, in a tremulous voice.

“Oh…” he said, looking down, “the computer’s going to do that now.”

“What?!” I was flabbergasted. “Nobody told me! Nobody said anything! What am I supposed to do now?!”

He couldn’t look me in the eye. Nor could he answer me. It was obvious that the changes weren’t his idea, and he wasn’t too happy about them either.

Then and there I started to have one of the worst headaches ever. If I had had the gumption, I might’ve gone higher up the “food chain” and asked – not in so many words, but a version of WWIC – Why Wasn’t I Consulted?! Then maybe someone could have explained the reasoning to me, and what my job duties would involve now – assuming I still had a job!

Not being very mature or methodical, I decided on a “you-can’t-fire-me-I-quit” course of action, and left the company. I can see now, looking back, that much of my future rested on that course of action. I spent the ensuing years as wife and mother, and didn’t work “outside the home” as the saying goes. As for later years, well, there was lots of work, all kinds – but that’s for blog posts to come. 😊