I thought about emailing HR, but decided it was too risky; the boss who had kissed me was well-liked, and the company had a reputation for being a boys’ club. Plus, I needed the job, even if it paid next to nothing. I’d just been accepted to grad school (I took only night classes so I could work full-time) and was already stretched thin living in Manhattan (even with three roommates and a $30-a-week grocery budget). I took a few breaths and told myself that it was just one incident. Right? That incident had technically happened outside of the office, even if it had been at a company event. And, well, I had been drinking, which means I should probably take some of the blame, no? Come to think of it, he was probably drunk, so that has to count for something. And…

I made a long list of excuses, telling myself that this was just how the adult world worked and that I had better toughen up. While I tried to convince myself that things would get better, my boss started openly talking about how he was looking for a new job, suddenly full of complaints about his current gig. It took two and a half months for him to give notice, during which we mostly kept things civil. “You must think I’m such a jerk,” he finally said on his last day. It was the sort of thing you’d expect to hear from a frat boy who spilled beer on your shoe — not from a manager who broke every rule in the corporate-orientation video on how not to be a creep.

Unfortunately, things didn't really get better after he left. A few months after the kiss incident, a male executive stopped by my desk to tell me the graduate school I attended was a “low Ivy.” He tossed me a magazine featuring the byline of his female friend (a woman I not only knew, but very much liked). “And she didn’t even need a fancy degree," he told me, a few flecks of spit hitting my face. I was startled less by the pettiness of his comment — this was a man in his 40s who still regularly inserted into conversation the fact that he played lacrosse in college — and more by the anger in his voice. He was almost twice my age, with a wife and kids and a big office. What did it matter to him where I chose to get my master’s degree?

Other moments included: yet another senior manager having an open conversation with a group of employees (including a female employee who, unbeknownst to him, was a friend of mine) about whom I was dating and whether or not we’d had sex; a mid-level staff member suggesting that my promotion must mean I was sleeping with the boss (who was older than my grandfather); and two older, male colleagues joking that I was too young and dumb to know how to use a fax machine. “After that, we’ll have to show her how to work a telephone,” one said. “And then the photocopier,” the other chimed in. They laughed like I wasn’t even in the room. I did my best not to roll my eyes at two guys swinging their dicks over a fax when I knew HTML, Avid, and Final Cut.