" In fact the " mask" theme has come up several times in my background reading. Richard Sennett, for example, in " The Corrosion of Character: The Personal Consequences of Work in the New Capitalism" , and Robert Jackall, in " Moral Mazes: The World of Corporate managers" , refer repeatedly to the " masks" that corporate functionaries are required to wear, like actors in an ancient Greek drama. According to Jackall, corporate managers stress the need to exercise iron self-control and to mask all emotion and intention behind bland, smiling, and agreeable public faces. Kimberly seems to have perfected the requisite phoniness and even as I dislike her, my whole aim is to be welcomed into the same corporate culture that she seems to have mastered, meaning that I need to " get in the face" of my revulsion and overcome it. But until I reach that transcendent point, I seem to be stuck in an emotional space left over from my midteen years: I hate you; please love me. "