A girl at work is very possessive of a specific chair and will force it's return from anyone who dares to be sitting in it when she arrives. A paltry, pitiful thing to be fussing over but considering most of the chairs in our office are broken, it's first come-first served for everyone.. except those who either bought their own chairs OR have a certain one for health reasons. She has neither.
So the other day I am in this chair. It wasn't done on purpose, the night crew moves them around and I just plopped into this chair at an empty desk. I'm working away when in comes the girl, makes a big show of looking for 'her' chair and finds it under my ass.
Now normally, she will take hold of the chair and insist people get out. But she didn't with me. She only said I'll have that tomorrow. I nodded in an offhand manner.
The next day she comes in and I'm in that chair again. I didn't hunt it down, it was still where I'd been from the day before. If she'd arrived before me, fair game, it would have been hers. Because I'd nodded I probably would have given it to her if she'd said anything. Yes, I'd decided to say a few words on the subject, something along the lines of.. because I agreed but not happening again sort of stuff. But she said not a word.
This has been a topic of conversation in the office. No one else will speak their mind and resentment simmers towards her. So I asked a co worker I consider a friend.. why do you suppose she's not in my face about this? What she said surprised me.
She said I myself know you are a lovely person, but of all the people in here, you are the last person I would want to piss off! She said, not that you've ever given any reason for me to feel like that, but it's the truth. I asked if it was my 'foreign-ness' perhaps making me unpredictable to them? Another friend said yes, something said with a different accent can be taken more seriously, or not as was intended.
Can you picture the bemusement on my face, the bewildered questioning arc to my brows? It makes me wonder about the disparity between the way I am viewed by others and the way I think of myself...
I WILL speak my mind, but very carefully, with words chosen specifically not to offend or blanket with sweeping generalizations. It doesn't happen often at all, in fact really hasn't happened at this new place of work except for once when I convinced a manager not to delay in speaking to us about a subject we had all worried over. But that was just me being ballsy and convincing :)
Have I successfully covered up the shy girl I am? It's true I am conscious of the old 'doormat' feeling and will do what I can to avoid it now.. But I still cry when I'm angry or overly frustrated. I still feel intimidated by many things. I just practice my serene face and reassure myself that knowledge or understanding will come to me in it's own time. I strive for patience.
Maybe they think me too strange to be predictable. After all, I left the 'Golden land of America' to come live among them. Left my family, my kids and everything I knew to come to a city ranked one of the most socio-economically deprived regions in the nation. People look at me in shock to hear I've relocated for love. What are you doing HERE!??.. I hear it all the time.
Am I strange? Would any American who moves here be seen the same or is it just me?
mmm.
introspection over.
For now.
2 comments:
You handled that well. I could use some lessons from you. Seriously.
On a not so serious note, your coworkers could have put her chair for sale on Ebay. A for sale sign in the chair and her computer waiting for her with browser up on Ebay and the listing. ;)
I had to call customer service with a company just recently and heard a British accent. She couldn't understand a word I said. LOL The southern accent was messing with her. It resulted to me talking very slowly and watching carefully how I said each word.
That *is* interesting, both her conduct, and how they perceive you. Perhaps Americans overall are viewed as more unpredictable, given our reckless government of the last eight years...
it is also rather amusing, and without ever saying a thing, perhaps a myth to let live!
I cannot believe someone could be possessive over what is in fact not any employee's property. If the arrangement is first come, first serve, then well... first come, first serve.
Nothing about you changed, K... you, are you, and we know that you! People form perceptions that are often way off the mark, they incorporate what they know in general with what they glean from other opinions, movies, and the like, and then insert you into the mix as a character in their perception, assigning you a role.
If it kept her from going off on you over a chair, I would not dispel the myth. ;-)
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