This time of my life was very confusing and complicated. As a management candidate I was supposed to eat, sleep and breathe professionalism. As I person I wasn't good at that. I found holding my tongue to be slightly harder than algebra. I'm quick with a quip. I cannot help it. I also had a problem that was checked on every report card in elementary school, "acts before thinking". Now it was more like, "blathers before she can help herself".
Employees made me crazy. Not all of them just most of them. I thought I was a whiner. These people could whine about everything and they did. It was too hot, it was too cold. Their cubicle neighbor wore perfume they didn't like. They wanted a window view. They should have gotten the $5.00 recognition check. They just couldn't drive three miles to work and get here on time. They didn't get asked to go to lunch with those people. They took more calls than Bobby. Bobby NEVER did anything. Bobby had an offensive picture hanging in his cubicle. The manager likes Susie better. You never give me the best schedule. It was daily and endless.
REALLY? Shut up and do your job, get here on time. LEAVE ME ALONE, I have actual responsibilities that don't include your issues. NO WAIT, that is my job. I am supposed to make sure you're happy so my managers don't get bad employee reviews. OK, "ah, cluck, cluck, coo, coo, poor baby...get to work".
And customers. I was the person who talked to the customers that wanted to speak to "your manager". I learned to be a nightmare from these people. My first call from an angry customer was a man who was beside himself with humiliation because our computer system held enough characters to list his business as, "Mr. Really Angry T. Butthead and Ass". Not associates. Ass. He didn't want his name reduced so we could make "ass" "assc". No, he wanted us to make the system use his entire company name. NOT HAPPENING DUDE! was not the answer, although really it was the answer. Compromise with me OR ass will be appropriate. Actually, I said, "Sir, I do understand your frustration and I wish I could reprogram the mainframe for you to accept your entire company name. I will forward that as a suggestion to the IT department, however, in the mean time if you let me change your company name to, "Really Angry Butthead" that will give me two more characters to give you Assc. on your invoice. Will that make you happy until Xerox can make the mainframe changes?" Yeah, that would never happen. He didn't need to know that and I needed him off my phone because I had an employee with a blister. Bullshit always comes in handy.
There has to be a better way to live than this. It was my first thought every morning and my last thought at night, Should have been a Beatle. I bet their lives were way more fun and they could hire people to deal with everyone. Was I asking for too much? A happy personal life? A relationship with a husband who respected me and wanted to be in my presence? A satisfying work life that didn't take 20 of the 24 hours of my day? A place to live with my husband that wasn't cities away from where I worked? I missed performing but I certainly had no time or patience for that. Elsie and I even jammed with Oops a few times. The harmony was spine tingling but I just couldn't do that. Creepy. Great band name, All My Husbands. I had no joy. I had nothing to look forward to and it was becoming apparent I was going to have to support myself forever so being in management would give me a better lifestyle than sharing an apartment with someone else. I might kill that person.
I was going to be forty soon, FORTY and still didn't feel like a grownup. I was sick of that too. Almost everyone I knew could not wait for the weekend so they could PARTY! I needed the weekend to catch up on my work and sleep. FORTY seemed like a good age to not have to be in a bar everyday or at some one's house or trying to get drunk and/or laid. I wanted a little island of silence, peace and contentment. Drunks were the same everywhere.
Drunksarerealsmartandlitketolectureabouteverysubjecttheyeverheardoforthoughtaboutonce.
I didn't need alcohol to be like that. I came that way. Trying to have a conversation with a drunk is like herding cats. You have to get their attention and hold it, then move them from point to point without them being distracted by anything that moves or is shiny. Pointless. I learned to just walk away from them. Yeah, blah, blah, blah, you're an idiot and you're welcome for my pointing that out.
Elsie and I were giving it another shot. I loved him underneath all the resentment and frustration. We went on vacation that was so much fun that I had hope. I held that hope until we returned home. Back to the routine. Back to our battle lines. I would not quit my job. He would not move. He would not stop or cut back much on his drinking. I had no tolerance left. The Lead Bub told me that Elsie just wanted to have sex. OH, well goody for him. ME TOO with a sober partner. And by the way Lead Bub, your advice carries NO weight. Try not to burn up your nose.
I believe people called me "Miss Congeniality" behind my back. I didn't care. Once the world figured out I was correct about everything it was going to be a much better to live.
Unfortunately, I still feel that way.
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