Curious.
Jess and I were sitting on the second floor of the library when a big green beetle appeared. It was buzzing outside the window and trying to get in. Thud, thud, thud. For five minutes straight it kept flying into the glass, not once learning its lesson.
These particular windows cannot be opened (and it’s not like we can talk the beetle out of its misery) so Jess and I could do nothing but watch.
Jess: “I feel like that beetle sometimes.”
Me, too.
Peripheral vision works wonders. Like last Thursday when I saw Colleen (my boss!) approach me at the lab computer. It looks like she is about to ask something, and now I get two extra seconds to think of something goofy to greet her with.
She goes first. “I have a question for you. Work-critical.”
“Which animal cracker is this?”
Colleen thought it was a squirrel, or a monkey. Maybe, I said. They both have big tails and chubby cheeks. But the face on the cracker looked like it had a big growl (and I swear I can imagine some whiskers around that nose), so my vote was for a big cat.
Perhaps the sticker on the animal cracker jar can provide a better clue.
I wasn’t able to attend the ceremony, but Mom sent me some photos over text and my brother Jeremy sent me some funny snapchats. I asked him over the phone if he was getting sentimental about it. Nah, not really, he said.
I wonder how I felt about high school graduation three years ago. Like him, I was ready to move on. But when I look back, I actually had a great high school experience. I try not to speak for other people, but it looks like he did, too.
Many of the teachers he had, I once had. And some of the activities and teams I joined (cross-country running, badminton), he also joined. So it was fun to ask him throughout the years what he thought of the same teachers and the same experiences. Even funnier when we notice the same quirks about the folks who dared to teach and coach rowdy teenagers for a living. We are brothers, after all.
So those are the phone conversations I will miss. No more juicy gossip from a place I once knew.
Family Name: _________________
First Name: ___________________
Phone Number: (___) ___-____
Here’s an interesting way to see who you are closest to. When you’re foaming at the mouth, who would you like to know about it first? Easy when you’re a child and can just write down your parents. But what happens when they aren’t around, and the closest friends you’ve made have all gone their separate ways?
Even more fascinating is who would put you on their form.
It doesn’t matter if it’s Christmas Eve. If the toilet clogs, the toilet clogs. (Even more embarrassing if it is your own doing).
When you’re flying back home for the holiday season, chances are you’ll bump into someone you know while waiting at the gate. Yesterday, it was an old high school friend I haven’t seen in over four years. He was two years above me (a huge difference back then) and would give me all sorts of juicy gossip about the school that only an upperclassman could give. I’m not sure what I offered in return — maybe a chance for him to play the mentor or sensei or something — much like how teachers and coaches find meaning in their careers.
——-
“I’ve lost contact with almost everyone [back in high school],” I told him.
“Me, too! Except for a few.”
——–
For a brief moment I romanticized the idea of hanging around the airport more often. Grocery store lines, bus stations, convention centers, and so on.
Then I realized I’d rather carry on with life.
Some sentences are more bitter than others, and a sentence like “nice guys finish last” is one of them. How tempting it is to believe that when people don’t treat you the way you wish to be treated. Holding a belief like that may protect you against a few jerks, but at the cost of fulfilling, meaningful relationships you could otherwise build.
This Veteran’s Day I was chatting with an old friend. She was telling me about how she saw one professor treating her grad and PhD students like crap in the lab, and how that was frustrating to witness, because those students were good students, and they didn’t deserve such treatment. “You don’t have to be mean to be respected,” she said.
Maybe the professor thinks this is the best way to prove that she deserves authority. That’s fine if you’re in charge of a research lab and would like things done in a particular way, and to do so with (and out of) fear and manipulation is certainly a quick way to go about it. But fear is not the same as respect, and the moment a better opportunity presents itself for the people you work with, that control you so deeply held will slip away as they all get the hell away from you.
My friend was talking about the professor, but the comment stuck with me. I was just starting to get frustrated with what I perceived as people taking advantage of me — something that bothers me more and more as I get older. They don’t respect me, I thought. I need to teach them a lesson.
I stopped myself then and there, but it’s easy to see how a perception like that can quickly spiral out of control.
I don’t want to fall into the trap of entitlement and feel that everybody is obligated to treat me with respect and kindness — the world doesn’t owe me anything — but at the same time, I don’t want to be a doormat. How do I walk that balance?
The conversation moved on from there, but it’s still in the back of my mind.
~~~~
“Did you call her out on this? [the professor?]”
“Wesley, I need a recommendation letter from her!”
What a complicated world. I would have done the same.
A misunderstanding had occurred, and (luckily) I was in the right. The other guy felt bad about it and apologized profusely. No, no, it’s alright. It happens, I tell him. I wanted to mean it when I said that, but in all honesty I still felt quite bitter. He tries to apologize more but I cut him off, wish him a good time, and then walk away.
And then came this smug feeling inside of me.
That is lekker slecht, loosely described.
It’s that smugness & satisfaction you feel when somebody has been a wiener to you, and they not only realize and acknowledge it, but also feel bad about it. And so, in an odd way, you feel good about the whole thing.
Or at least slightly better.