I've been feeling a bit peeved off lately concerning work. There's this one little thing that's irritated me since last Friday, and now I can't stop thinking about it.
I had a conversation with a 'superior' of mine last week, there were a few others there though, so it was during a group coffee break when it happened.
One of them asked the rest of us whether we were going to a fellow colleague of ours birthday the following weekend. That fellow colleague wasn't there during the time. I didn't really hear the question because he sort of mumbled it, so when he looked at me, I asked what he'd said.
He repeated "you going to ........ birthday?"
I paused because then I realised what he was saying, and remembering that I was busy that night, replied "Oh! I have a wedding that night."
The guy joked and made some sort of comment about my ridiculously busy schedule, to which my superior added, jokingly, "Oh, excuses excuses."
Hee hee hee.
I just sort of laughed it off, and I think the conversation changed to something else. But something about it stuck with me.
That night at home I told Hubbie. He's met my superior, so he could imagine the person saying it. He may not know the person well, but he's a very good judge of character.
He told me that yes, he could imagine this person saying that. Having met this person, he could see how they would say something, in a friendly, joking way, but deep within be believing of that comment, that it was not a joke but in fact the truth.
So I was right. My superior didn't believe me. Believed that I was making up an excuse to not go to this colleague of ours birthday.
It really shitted me. And it still does. Yes, I know that every time we talk about our weekends, that my stories always include some dinner, birthday, christening, engagement, wedding or get together that I've had. I realise that normal people don't usually have a birthday and a christening on one day and then a bridal shower on the next. And I realise that my superior is probably secretly shitty because they went to my birthday and I didn't go to theirs, because of the birthday/christening day we had a few weeks back.
But you know what? Our family isn't normal. We don't have one cousin and a few uncles and aunties that we see twice a year for Christmas and Easter. We don't have family functions that include the whole family sitting on an extended stretched out table.
We have uncles and aunties that have several kids each, all of who have more kids of their own. We have our parents' cousins and family friends on top of all this. This isn't including our large group of friends, acquired through school, work and recreational activities. If you've worked in more than one place, like both Hubbie and I have, you can start to see how your group of friends suddenly becomes quite large.
If we invite everyone we know in our family to a social event, we need to hire out a RECEPTION. This is no exaggeration. We had under 400 people at our wedding. That tells you that we know a lot of people. And yes granted, a lot of those people are friends of the family that our parents had to invite only because they were once invited to their sons/daughters wedding 15 years earlier. But that's what our family is, that's what we do. The most distant relative will invite you to a function, and you're expected to do the same.
Add to that our friends, OUTSIDE of work, and you start to get a picture. Hubbie had this same issue a while back, where the guys he worked with stirred him and couldn't really believe how many functions he had, wedding after wedding, on the same weekend.
But if you think about it, what reason is there to lie? And if you were to lie, why would you make up some ridiculous excuse about having a wedding on a Saturday and then another wedding following on a Sunday? It's so far-fetched and ridiculous that it MUST be true.
We have a lot of people in our life, we are truly blessed. So, to someone that comes from a different background, with a smaller family, why should that be weird to them, why should they believe something other than the truth, why would they believe that I'm lying?
They believe this because they think I'm trying to get out of going to the work get together. Fair enough, I missed their birthday, now I'm missing this one....... it MUST mean that. Surely, you can't have that many functions, you can't have that many friends, you can't have more people in your life, and have more places to go to, and be more busy than me.........
Ahhhhhhhh. That is it. That is the answer. This person, if they wanted to, COULD believe me. If they wanted to. They COULD believe that it is possible to be that busy. But then it would mean accepting the truth that their life isn't as busy, filled with as much people and parties, as mine.
And that is the hard part to swallow. It's jealousy, as much as they don't want to admit it. Which makes me sad. I hate jealousy. I hate when I see it consuming people, little or a lot. It doesn't matter how much it is, because the end result is the same. Resentment.
So this person has disguised their jealousy and resentment with distrustfulness, because that is easier to accept. Rather than the truth. Which really peeves me off. Such a small comment, yet such a window into their mind and the way they think.
I'm a very honest person. So for someone to believe, and suggest even in a joking way, of me being manipulative and lying to get out of a situation, out of an event? Me, party person, always busy wanting to go out and do stuff?
Bull crap.
It soooooo gets to me. Like really truly. And I hate the way I'm now looking at my superior. I'm extra aware of our interactions, and just this morning when I looked up to say something, I saw them looking at me in an odd observational way. Sussing me out.
I hate it. Hate, hate, hate it. I can feel the jealousy and the scrutiny, and I need to set them straight, via my incredible subtle powers!
Because they're my superior, and I can't just come out and say it. Because of just that word. 'Superior.'
Annoying.
Sigh. Why are people so complicated?
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