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Jibralta

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  • 2 weeks later...

I often go walking during lunch with one of my coworkers, Lisa.

 

She is about my age, married with two children.

 

She’s very friendly and social.

 

But I think she might be schizophrenic.

 

She mentioned to me a couple of times that she thinks certain people in our office are following her. She asks me if I’ve noticed. When I say I haven’t noticed, she always seems surprised.

 

She’s only been like this a handful of times.

 

But she was pretty agitated today and vented to me during our walk. The list of people following her is growing. Plus, she thinks other people are being followed.

 

I’m not sure what to do.

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I think that continuing what you have been doing is best. Listening, asking her how she has come to that conclusion, and disagreeing with that idea. Gently, of course.

 

It can be terrifying for someone with schizophrenia to find that their perception of reality does not match with others' realities.

 

Make sure she knows you are solid support for her but that you have concern due to the "reality" discrepancies.

 

It may or may not be schizophrenia. Could be a medical issue.However, it sounds exactly like my sister (with schizophrenia ) when she is off her medication.

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Yes, I interacted extensively with two schizophrenic people when I was in my early-20s.

 

Lisa reminded me of one of them, a lady who took some ceramics classes with me in college. Her name was Pat, and she was probably about 50 years old.

 

She was very friendly and chatty, just the way that Lisa is. But then she mentioned a couple of things that didn't make sense to me, something about people listening on an airplane, and people "knowing" things....... These anecdotes came out of her mouth as naturally as all of the normal things that she had been saying, and I was unprepared.

 

I challenged her about it. I didn't realize it was a delusion and I wanted her to make sense. I was like, "What do you mean they know? Who knows? What do they know?" And Pat's expression became like, "Uh-oh, she's one of them...." That's the fear you speak of. I understand it more now. It's not always "She's one of them." Sometimes it's "oh no I've lost my reality again..."

 

Pat's fearful reaction actually made me angry. But I was much younger then, and didn't understand.

 

Actually there was a third possibly-schizophrenic person that I knew growing up. I didn't know her personally, but I knew her because she worked in a Roy Rogers in my town. Her job was to clean the salad bar, and the whole time she muttered curse words and things like, "I'm gonna kill them." No joke. She was there for more than 20 years, never harmed a fly. But that was my only experience with mental illness--or so I thought.

 

These days, I know there are much subtler forms of mental illness, and that my own mother is probably borderline. But in my early 20s, the Roy Rogers lady was the poster child for me, and Pat's quiet delusions really freaked me out. But we were in a couple of the same fine arts classes over the next few years, and I eventually got used to her.

 

The second person I knew with schizophrenia was my boyfriend's mother. She was a sad case, literally disabled by the illness. I see that now, in retrospect. Pat could at least get herself organized enough to go to college for a couple of years. But poor Mary was barely able to keep her own house.

 

She lived in squalor. She chain-smoked cigarettes literally one after the other, and then she picked through the ashtrays and smoked the spent butts. In the mornings, she hacked until she vomited. The walls of the house were deep yellow with nicotine stains. Eventually, I repainted her whole house and refinished her hardwood floors. I couldn't get all of the stains out of the hardwood, but they did look better. Clean, at least.

 

She was a very nice lady, doting even. But truly helpless. I dated her son for 16 months. Three times, she stopped taking her medication and had to be hospitalized. Her delusions were extremely intense. One night, she ripped the phone lines out of the walls. Another time, she harassed people at a local gas station, and at department store. She was arrested then. The third time, I thought she was going to attack me. I reacted in a regretful manner, flipping her both middle fingers and screaming in her face as my boyfriend ushered me out of the house.

 

Anyway, if Lisa is schizophrenic, it's mild or very well-controlled.

 

I think that continuing what you have been doing is best. Listening, asking her how she has come to that conclusion, and disagreeing with that idea. Gently, of course.

 

Make sure she knows you are solid support for her but that you have concern due to the "reality" discrepancies.

 

I will keep this in mind. In the past, it was challenging for me, but now I think it is something I can do.

 

The frustrating part is that I can't really talk to anyone at work about it. I wish that someone else besides me was aware of it.

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Well, a couple of weeks back, I started to tell the tale of Brian, Larry, and Angry-Dad-Mitch. Mainly, I wanted to talk about Mitch. But I had to talk about Brian and Larry to set the scene. Now, it's weeks later and I still haven't finished the story. I really don't feel like it. Bottom line is, Mitch is a dck.

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My seven-year anniversary with Arnold is coming up. That's the longest either of us has ever been in a relationship.

 

My max was 18 months, back when I was 17 lol. After that, it was pretty much carnage.

 

A couple months into our relationship, I took Arnold to meet my cousins. They all liked him. When Arnold came around again the next year, my cousin David exclaimed, "You're still here!"

 

Arnold didn't know how to take that. He thought it was both funny and slightly offensive.

 

So, when our two-year anniversary came up and officially marked my longest relationship, I got Arnold a t-short that said, "I'M STILL HERE."

 

I figured he could wear it in front of David and get a laugh.

 

This year, I think we're both deserving of t-shirts.

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The GC on one of my jobs (Mike) contacted me and said he had a possible opportunity. So, I arranged a meeting with Mike and the potential client.

 

When I arrived at the client's office, Mike was sitting in the small reception area, chatting with the receptionist. Upon seeing me enter the suite, he said in his Italian accent, "This is Jibralta."

 

I extended my hand to the receptionist and we shook hands.

 

She didn't introduce herself, so I said, "What's your name?"

 

She gave me a strange look, and then said, "Jibralta."

 

I was like, "Oh, I'm Jibralta, too!"

 

Then I turned to Mike and saw him sitting back. I realized that what he had done was pretty funny. He'd introduced us both with an impressive economy of words.

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  • 2 weeks later...

That coworker of mine, Lisa, brings to mind this post by Frazen, from back in January:

 

It might sound like a silly issue to you, but I'm a very sensitive person. I have antlers with which I detect people's emotions, and my agility in sympathizing has helped me a lot in my life; it's a type of emotional intelligence, but it has its own downsides: I have an insatiable desire for people's emotions. I love to see them cry or laugh uncontrollably, I love it when they share their problems with me, I suck in their thoughts, their feelings, and their memories and it gives me so much meaning in life.

 

That post stuck in my mind because I thought it was an interesting disposition, and possibly the opposite of mine. Although, I can't say for sure that I am repelled by other people's emotions. It could be that I am just suspicious of them, having been raised in a home where I was burdened by them.

 

Anyway, I remembered this post a couple of weeks ago, while talking to Lisa. Sometimes when I talk to her, she seems so interested. It's like she's feeding off of what I'm saying, gaining sustenance. And I'm sitting there like, "How is this so interesting to her?? Is she eating my emotions? Does she have antlers??"

 

I couldn't for the life of me remember who had posted the quote above. I had a vague impression of their avatar. But today, as I was clicking around, I found it! So, I'm putting it here so that I can find it again.

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I had a weirdly stressful situation today, driving a short 10 minutes from one place to another. It started after I ended up behind a really slow person. When we got to the next light, I pulled up alongside her on the left. It was a three-lane road, and I was now in the middle lane, at the front of the line. I intended to pass the slowpoke as soon as the light changed.

 

Right as I found my position, I heard an ambulance approaching. After a few moments of siren only, I saw it coming up behind the stack of traffic that I fronted. I started to shift over towards my right to let the ambulance by me on the left, but it seemed that the ambulance wanted to pass me on the right instead of the left.

 

I didn't know where the ambulance expected me to go. There was another car on my left, and limited room. There was ample space the middle of the intersection, but if I drove my car into the intersection I risked blocking the path of the ambulance (I couldn't tell which way he was heading).

 

So, I slowly and carefully navigated my car to the left. But it seemed like no amount of space I made was enough for the impatient ambulance! I heard his shrill ambulance horn buzzing over the siren. Finally, there was nowhere left for me to go but into the middle of the intersection.

 

Then ambulance passed, the light turned green, the traffic gridlocked into the intersection, but I swiftly circumvented Ms. Slowpoke and was back on my way. I marveled about the aggressiveness of the ambulance driver and remembered when I'd seen an ambulance flipped on its side on the Parkway. "That's how it happens," I mused to myself, "Aggression is a form of stupidity."

 

Traffic narrowed to a slow-moving single file column, typical for that road at that time. As I idled at one of the lights, an oncoming pickup truck paused alongside my car. I could tell he wanted to make a left into the convenience store that I was semi-blocking. So, I let my car roll forward to make some space for him to turn in behind me.

 

In my rear view mirror, I watched the car behind me roll forward and close the gap I'd just made. So, I rolled forward again. The car behind me rolled forward again and closed the gap. It was Ms. Slowpoke, clearly an idiot. I was like, "What the f*ck are you doing?" I rolled forward some more, and she rolled right up behind me like someone had stapled her bumper to my bumper.

 

I had no more space to roll. The guy in the pick up truck was S.O.L. I was yelling into my rear view mirror. Ms. Oblivious Slowpoke back there was making me into a jerk. I cast a worried glance at the pick up driver and--to my great surprise--saw that he was laughing heartily.

 

I felt better instantly. I realized that Slowpokey had probably been the source of that whole rigmarole with the ambulance, as well--her immovable oblivion was probably the reason why I had to jockey my car all around the frickin road to let the ambulance by!

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I am getting the impression that many people are aware of my intense dislike for Frank. I've been deliberately vocal on the subject at work, but the information seems to have gone a bit deeper than I'd intended.

 

For example, a couple of weeks ago, I overheard Joe (structural engineer) and Ray (his manager) talking in one of the conference rooms. They were meeting about the project that I worked on for Frank--a real disaster that I would like to be done with forever.

 

Frank was late for the meeting and Ray was saying, "Let's just talk to Jibralta. She knows the project and she'll be able to tell us what we need to know." Joe said, "I think we should just wait for Frank. Jibralta doesn't want anything to do with this project. It just makes her angry."

 

But Ray still wanted to talk to me. I realized that I had a ridiculous expression on my face (a wide-eyed angry grimace) when Joe laughed and said, "You see?" But I acquiesced and they went easy on me.

 

Yesterday, I don't remember exactly how it went, but they were making jokes about me and that project, and Frank. To my face, of course. They were having a grand old laugh about it. I laughed; it was amusing. But I do worry that this could cause more problems for me and stupid Frank. He never reacts the way I expect him to. He always does something extremely stupid.

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Just watched My Best Friend's Wedding for possibly the second time in my life.

 

It was ok.

 

I don't know why I thought I might like it better this time around.

 

I think my perspective on life changed since I first saw it. I think I rooted more for Julia Roberts' character back then. Interestingly, I noticed that many of the people who wrote reviews for the movie talked about having the same experience. I guess priorities change for all of us.

 

I also found it sort of boring. There were definitely some funny parts, and some great physical comedy by Julia Roberts, but it didn't move forward smoothly.

 

Some things that didn't change since the first time I watched it: Rupert Everett stole the show again. Hands down the funniest character in the movie. Razor sharp. Cameron Diaz, too. She's hilarious. I love when she slams Julia Roberts against the bathroom stall and calls her "Big Hair." I loved that even when I used to root for Julia's character.

 

I think I'll watch Bad Moms next.

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My sister's husband's 90-something grandmother lost all her money by a Madoff type, right after he was exposed. She went from living a comfortable retirement lifestyle to counting pennies. It was hard to watch.

 

My mom and step dad lost everything to an investor. Now my step dad has to work until he drops dead. He is 80 this year and still works full time . He lost his entire pension to someone he trusted. Then the company he used to work for went bankrupt so they lost their benefits. So I get to watch my mom and stepdad do with out when they busted their ass their whole life.

 

A Ponzi scheme hit close to home for me. My family and I were not affected, thank god. But my friends' family was affected. The worst thing was that the scam was perpetrated by our mutual friend's parents.

 

The mutual friend was named Paul Nadin.* His parents were Mr. and Mrs. Nadin, collectively refered to as "The Nadins" by all. The Nadins were quirky, charming, and morbidly obese.

 

My friends and I hung out at the Nadins' house when I was 15 - 17. It was complete chaos there. We could pretty much do anything we wanted in Paul's room, which occupied two rooms in the lower level of the house. We smoked cigarettes, smoked pot, drank. Paradise for rebellious kids.

 

The Nadins largely ignored what we were doing. They weren't stupid; they knew what was going on, and occasionally Mrs. Nadin would have a meltdown and say, "No smoking! No pot!" But then she'd go back on her Prozac and things would return to normal. Paul's friends--all of us--were welcome in their home. His parents cooked us large, expensive meals of steak and lobster, treated everyone like family. Two of Paul's close friends, Ray and Ethan, actually lived with them. Paul's sister's boyfriend lived with them as well.

 

The Nadins were also fond of my boyfriend, Ed. Ed didn't live with them, but he spent a lot of time over there. Ed and I started dating when I was 15, and then I spent a lot of time at the Nadins', too. For the record, Ed didn't smoke, drink or do drugs. And within 6 months of us dating, I ceased smoking pot & cigarettes. I wasn't much of a drinker at that point. I abstained from all of these substances during the 18 months that we were together. Just thought I'd throw that in there.

 

Mr and Mrs. Nadin were both accountants. My first job ever was working for them during tax season. Like their home, their office was chaotic. I remember when the time came for my first paycheck, Mr. Nadin opened his checkbook and said, "How much do you want?" I suspected at that time that I could probably name any wage and I would get it. But I didn't want to feel a sense of obligation. So, I gave him the minimum wage amount, which was at that time about $5.05/hr.

 

During tax season, the Nadins sent Ed and me to the food store with a huge grocery list and a blank check. We got everything on their list, which was way too much for even their house full of people to consume. Much of the food went bad. The food actually rotted in the house and it took a long time before someone cleaned it. This happened numerous times.

 

At the end of tax season, the Nadins bought a Sedan de Ville and gave the Town Car to Paul. Paul was only 16 at the time and had no license. Not long after that, the Nadins bought and moved into a new house and left the old house to Paul.

 

Ed and I gradually grew apart from Paul and his family. But Ray and Ethan remained very close to them. When Paul finished school (I think he went the GED route), his parents bought him a gas station and a fleet of tow trucks. Ethan started working for Paul as a mechanic in his garage (all of this was very convenient for me when my car broke down!).

 

Ethan started dating a friend of mine named Cheryl. Ray and Paul moved out of Paul's house and Cheryl moved in. Somehow this was ok with everyone. The Nadins took Cheryl and Ethan on yearly vacations with Paul, Paul's sister, and their respective significant others to places like Cancun, the Bahamas, Disney World, Venezuela, etc.

 

When I graduated high school and went to college, I lost touch with that group of people more and more. They still took care of me if I got a flat, needed a jump or a tow, or if I locked my keys in my car (embarrassingly frequent occurrence). But day-to-day communication was basically nil.

 

Ethan and Cheryl married. They had two kids, bought a house.

 

Paul's parents bought Paul a junk yard and Ethan started running Paul's garage.

 

Then the recession hit and Paul's parents got busted by the FBI for running a ponzi scheme. LOTS of people had been scammed out of their life's savings.

 

Mr. and Mrs. Nadin were tried and convicted. Both were sent to prison. Mr. Nadin died there. Paul lost his garage, his gas stations, tow trucks, and his junk yard. Obviously, the Nadins lost their accounting firm. Their daughter kept her travel agency, and some suspect she's hidden some of the stolen money overseas.

 

The worst thing about all of this is that Ethan and Cheryl, who really had no inkling that this was going on, lost their house. Poor Ethan, who looked on the Nadins as parents, had signed a bunch of paperwork that made him the owner of all these seized properties. He had no idea that the Nadins had paid for the property using stolen money. He thought he was doing them a tax favor. And, since they took such good care of him and Chryl, he felt obligated to help them.

 

---------------------------------------------

*totally fake name--all these names are fake, as usual. I just hate doing the single-initial thing.

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Catherine died. She was found dead in her home during a house fire. Nobody knows what happened. It's possible that nobody outside of her immediate family will ever know.

 

I found out about it in the most random way. Arnold had woken up one night around 1AM, got up and went out to the living room to schmooze around. I got up about a half an hour later to use the bathroom. When he heard me, he called out, "Catherine's dead. She died in a house fire."

 

I was like, what the hell? How could he know something like that? Neither of us know anyone who knew her aside from my coworkers.

 

Apparently, it showed up on his yahoo news feed as local news.

 

I sat down on the couch with him and googled it. It was there in the news. A neighbor reported a fire, and the firemen found Catherine dead as they fought the fire.

 

I figured it was a suicide, but of course I don't know.

 

I'm not sure if I mentioned this before, but Catherine attempted to commit suicide a couple of months after she was laid off. I wasn't surprised then, either.

 

I guess I should probably feel bad or sad, but I don't feel much about Catherine but repugnance. She crossed some line with me and I just have this cold indifference towards her.

 

I don't think many people get to this point with me, but it does happen.

 

I do feel bad for the two sons that she fathered. They are pretty young, and I am sure they will be devastated. Suicide or not, it's a terrible way for someone to go.

 

Well, the mode of death might not matter long to the person dying, but it does matter for the people they leave behind.

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This sounds terrible, but I mainly feel relieved that there is no chance that I will run into her again.

 

Seriously.

 

I cannot tell you how deep that sense of relief is.

 

I do understand the tragedy, and part of me does sympathize with it. But maybe that's just in a general sense.

 

There's so much I can say about this whole thing, but I think it will be a while before I can get my thoughts together.

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This sounds terrible, but I mainly feel relieved that there is no chance that I will run into her again.

 

Seriously.

 

I cannot tell you how deep that sense of relief is.

 

I do understand the tragedy, and part of me does sympathize with it. But maybe that's just in a general sense.

 

There's so much I can say about this whole thing, but I think it will be a while before I can get my thoughts together.

 

It's not terrible. I totally get that. She wreaked havoc at work and directed it at you.

 

It was likely suicide - she was deeply troubled and dysfunctional, from your descriptions.

 

I just lament the loss of a life - someone's parent, someone's child.

 

Perhaps it is a relief for family, too. When my boys and I attended a memorial service for a friend of theirs, the parents seemed so relieved that he was gone. It was suicide. He was a wild child all the way to the end.

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Glad you understand.

 

Perhaps it is a relief for family, too. When my boys and I attended a memorial service for a friend of theirs, the parents seemed so relieved that he was gone.

 

I suspect that it is a similar situation for her family.

 

People at my office did genuinely like her and were saddened to hear of her passing. I would have liked her too, had I not had to work for her and experience her outrageous irresponsibility, preposterous sense of entitlement, and poor personal boundaries. I can only imagine that her ex wife and children had it at least ten times worse than I did.

 

I don't know if I mentioned previously, but Catherine was divorced and not on good terms with her ex wife. Their relationship seemed extremely contentious, actually. Catherine said that her ex caused all of the trouble, but I always wondered if that was a fair statement.

 

When Catherine transitioned, she and her wife had two small children. I imagine her wife felt very overwhelmed, to say the least. First with the sudden revelation that her husband was transgendered, and second with the prospect of how their two children would cope. And knowing Catherine as I do, I am sure her wife was pretty much left stuck in the mud with all of the responsibilities--I can see how she would be angry.

 

Catherine was also on bad terms with her in-laws, who she liked to refer to as her "out-laws." This was particularly surprising because her in-laws are avid social justice activists. Catherine must have really pissed them off to get on their shtlist.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Sometimes it seems like there is a rotating door at my job. People are hired, people are fired, people quit, people are hired. I remember on my first day, the IT guy set me up and said something like, "Good luck. We'll see if you make it." And other people had comments like that, too: "Still here?" "We didn't scare you off yet?"

 

Needless to say, I got the sense that there was a high rate of turnover.

 

I don't know how many people have come and gone since I started a little over a year ago. I think it could be 20 people! I can recall at least ten that have left, and at least as many were hired in their place. One poor lady, Pratima, was fired last week, while she was on vacation!

 

That really gets to me. Why would they fire her while she was on vacation? I don't think I work for asshles, but who does that?

 

My vacation is coming up soon, and part of me is freaking out. What if they decide to fire me?

 

I think this could just be stress talking. I have a lot going on in my life right now. My court case is coming up on Tuesday (I'm suing my gym). I have a slew of doctor's appointments over the next god knows how many months that will require me to miss work. Two doctor's appointments are next week, so I may miss 16 hours of work next week when all is said and done.

 

I've been working extra hours to make up all of my missed time, and honestly they don't seem to mind. Every time I try to talk to Paul (Finance/HR guy) about my schedule he pretends to fall asleep and starts snoring. Then he tells me, "Fine, whatever," and shoos me out of his office.

 

He would definitely tell me if I was doing something wrong. I really think that the stress of all of this medical and legal stuff is making me paranoid.

 

I've experienced something like this before, where stress from one aspect of my life caused acute stress over a second, completely unrelated issue. I obsessed over this unrelated issue. The crazy thing was, the second issue usually didn't cause me any anxiety at all. I realized I had been transferring the stress once the first issue was resolved, and my anxiety over the second issue had also vanished.

 

I'm also having trouble sleeping, which is additional evidence that my freak-out is stress-related.

 

My insurance company keeps rejecting the claims from my pain management doctor. My personal injury lawyer's paralegal assures me that this is normal, and that my doctor is very aggressive in dealing with insurance companies.

 

I had an independent medial exam today after work, and I have no idea what the guy is going to tell my insurance company. I hate insurance companies. I don't trust them at all.

 

Here are some additional stressors. Really, they are the most immediate ones, the ones that are causing my anxiety at the moment:

 

In this industry, you have to stay billable. This means I always have to be producing a deliverable for a project. I also have to be at or under budget. My main project has been a bit slow during these last few weeks because we are waiting for information. It doesn't make sense to work on the project without this information. I'd just be burning through the budget. So, I have to look for work elsewhere. I have to scrounge.

 

I was working on a small job for Ivan, but that wrapped up right as he left for vacation last week. He will be gone for another week, so that well is dry for the time being. I got a small job from Mitchell, but that is basically done. I did a couple small jobs for a lady named Sharon. She is a project manager and runs jobs for the biggest client in the firm. On the last job I did, which I finished today, she said (and this is the REAL stressor here), "I feel like you're taking too long to do this." And suddenly it seemed like she didn't want to give me any more work.

 

Immediately, my thoughts went to Pratima. Holy sht, they're gonna get rid of me next. That was echoing through my head for the rest of the day. It doesn't matter that I've never actually been reprimanded for anything. It doesn't matter that Pratima had a lousy reputation and was not well-liked. I was slow, and that was going to get me fired.

 

I told my boyfriend about this on my way home. He said, "They're not going to fire you. And I wouldn't be worried even if they did fire you." I know he's probably right. All the same, I figured it would probably be a good idea to update my resume. I also reached out to the architect that I moonlighted for briefly last year, right before I took this job. It was just a quick "hi," but he responded very quickly and said, "The door's always open" and "stop by any time." I hope that means he'll hire me if I need a job lol.

 

Driving back from dinner tonight with Arnold, my mind kept wandering away from our conversation to focus on today's independent medical exam, and Tuesday's court case. Both are definitely weighing heavily on me. I feel better about the exam, because my doctor is supposedly aggressive.

 

I feel trepidation about court. I'd hoped that the gym would just mail me a check and we could cancel the whole thing. On Monday, my chiropractor told me that the law allowed gyms to interpret "cancel" as "freeze." I don't know if I buy that. I read the statute and there is no mention of freezing a membership. My chiropractor countered that the 'freeze' interpretation could have been made through a court ruling, and therefore would not have made it back into the statute. This pissed me off and I was grumpy for the rest of the appointment.

 

I hope my mood clears up a bit after the case whether I win (hopefully) or lose and have to appeal. I'd hate to have another vacation like last year, when I didn't know if I'd have a job when I got back. It's crazy that what I feared might happen to me actually did happen to somebody else.

 

Interestingly, I just realized that the two things I was worrying about in the car with Arnold were NOT my job security.

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With the rotating door that we have at work, I just can't figure out how someone like Frank is still with the company. I think Mark must love him in some way.

 

I remember when I had my interview with Frank, Frank told me that he'd met Mark years ago, when he (Frank) was working for a developer. He said that the developer had hired Mark's company because they needed to outsource some work. Frank said that he knew his boss was ultimately going to stiff Mark's company for the work that they did. He felt bad about that and let Mark know. Sure enough, Frank's boss didn't pay Mark's company. Even though Mark got stiffed, he appreciated that Frank tried to warn him. At some point after that, he said to Frank, "Why don't you come work for me."

 

Apparently, that's Mark's line. I got a similar story from Eddie, although the circumstances were different. For years, Eddie Mark's company hired Eddie to testify as an expert witness in various hearings. One day, Mark said to Eddie, "Why don't you come work for me."

 

People really like to hear that line! I can see why. It's flattering, especially when it comes from a successful business owner that everyone probably looks up to.

 

But I think Mark makes a lot of decisions from the heart.

 

Sometimes I want to say to him, "How do you not see that Frank sucks? How do you not see that he is riding the line of negligence? How do you not see that he is the source of the problems in all of his projects?"

 

Obviously, this would not be the best approach to take.

 

The other day, I thought of a better way to communicate this information.

 

First, I should say that I would never broach the subject of Frank's incompetence unless I had to. But I often imagine the conversation occurring. The imagined situation is one where I have to defend myself because of Frank's negligence.

 

"How do you not see that Frank sucks?" would be a tough sell under those circumstances.

 

I think a better approach would have to be along the lines of, "I think you've done Frank a huge favor by putting him in the position that he's in. But he is not returning the favor to you."

 

Because that's the real core issue here. Frank is assuming a role that he is not prepared for. And he is not taking steps to properly fulfill his responsibilities. He deflects and avoids and shifts blame.

 

He's in the perfect environment for that because there is a huge blame-game running in this office. Nobody is taking control. I wish I could see the senior leadership meetings. I get the sense that the partnership is somewhat fractured.

 

Nothing for me to do there but watch and wait and learn from the consequences of others' actions.

 

Anyway, I'm really writing because I think I learned something else about Mark. I think there might be a limit/obstacle in his information absorption. I noticed it on Thursday, when I asked him a question about intumescent paint. He typed the word, "intumescent" into google but he REALLY misspelled it.

 

Now, that misspelling would not be a big deal for Joe Shmo off the street. Normal people don't toss the word "intumescent" around on a daily basis (or ever). But all architects have an awareness of the term and the concept.

 

And you might think, ok, big deal. He misspelled a word. But this is something that I've seen in people--friends relatives, coworkers--who are totally intelligent, but who for whatever reason didn't fully grasp certain elements of learning that were related to reading. As a result, they become a bit creative and resourceful in order to gain certain understanding.

 

Examples. When I was in undergraduate school, I worked for the campus electricians. I remember my boss trying to make a joke using using the word "coodiments." He knew he didn't have the word quite right. He said, "Is that the word, when you get a medal?" I had no idea what he was talking about until he asked one of the office-ladies, later on. She said, "You mean 'acoutrements.'

 

One summer, I worked alongside a guy in a warehouse, handing out pick-tickets. He spoke fluent Spanish and I spoke limited Spanish. But the workers teased him that my Spanish was better. Why? Because I'd learned to read the language and my counterpart had never learned to read it. He'd learned the language phonetically.

 

In all cases, the understanding is there. But since phonetic means were used to gain it, some etymological element is lost that would otherwise provide and solidify the framework for a more robust understanding. I think that people who rely the phonetic approach to learning are aware of this missing element and are always seeking ways to bridge that gap by relying on other people and using context clues.

 

I should add that I myself have certain "limits" when it comes to learning, and certain tricks that I have learned to employ to make myself absorb information. Institutions label these things as learning disabilities, but really I think that it's a teaching disability and a side-effect of stereotype and over-standardization.

 

I was clinically diagnosed with ADHD back in 1984 and even though I was told it was a limit and that I needed to do certain things in order to learn (like limit sugar intake, take ritalin, and sit in front of the class) I knew inherently that these things were not true. I have no problem learning. I just don't learn well in a classroom environment. I am still to this day discovering how my mind absorbs information and it is really fascinating. But most people would like to tell me that it cannot happen this way.

 

Anyway, before I get too far off into the weeds, my point is that I can see how someone like Frank could actually be useful to Mark. But I think Mark is turning a blind eye to a lot of harmful crap, and I wish he would find someone better to rely on.

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Gosh J, with all the stressful unpredictable things that continually go on at your work, getting laid off may be a blessing.

 

Collect unemployment for the time being and find employment that makes you happy.

 

Easy for me to say, right?! Being let go is uncomfortable no matter what.

Just trust that no matter what, you'll land on your feet.

 

My job is becoming somewhat redundant with the times. I have the same concerns. I swing back and forth feeling anxious and in the next moment I'd wish they'd let me go! Change is waaaaay way overdue for me.

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I get the impression that the weekly “production meetings” for upper management are a lot like the Middle East Peace Talks.

 

There’s a pervasive lack of standard and lack of professional development here, and everyone seems to be in denial about it. Not to mention an inability to schedule.

 

Even so, I actually do feel like I am getting useful experience, and I do actually like the place (believe it or not!). So unless they boot me out I plan to stay for at least 2 - 3 more years.

 

It couldn’t hurt to update my resume and put some feelers out, though. Not that I wouldn’t enjoy a couple relaxing weeks of collecting unemployment ;)

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I spoke to Paul this past Sunday, while I was in the office making up hours. I think that man works every single day.

 

After some hemming and hawing, I worked up the courage to ask him what happened with Pratima. Past experience has shown me that companies tend to be pretty tight-lipped about terminations, but this is a family-run company and every secret tends to be an open secret.

 

Even so, his response was surprisingly forthcoming. "She had to go," he said, "And I had a big hand in it." He said that defiantly, like I was going to try to give him crap about it. But I put my hands up to say, "Hey, no problem."

 

He continued, "I told them: If they want to bring in better people and still be able to hand out bonuses at the end of the year, they have to make a profit. And if they want to make a profit, they have to get rid of dead weight like her. They should have fired her before her vacation. They should have fired her months ago."

 

Everybody makes mistakes. That's why we have people check the drawings before they go out. But it seems that Pratima never bothered to correct her mistakes or update her drawings, even when planning boards came back with comments. She agreed to correct them, and she said she corrected them, but she never actually corrected them.

 

After Pratima went away on vacation, one of these mistakes came home to roost big time. They gave the project to another architect to correct, but the problem was so bad that the guy had to redo the whole set. Pratima had been copy-pasting between different jobs and nothing made sense.

 

I decided to put some feelers out about Sharon. I said, "Well, I try to emphasize quality over quantity, but that's gotten me in trouble! Sharon complained on Friday that I took too long to complete some elevations."

 

Paul interjected, "That's because Sharon doesn't know how to manage people. She doesn't make her expectations known, and then she runs out of time or over budget."

 

I said, "Well, to be honest, I had no idea how much time she'd budgeted for those drawings. If I'd known ahead of time, I would have made different decisions. I think what I have to do is be proactive and ask."

 

I think he agreed. I'm not actually sure what he said. But I felt a little more settled after talking with him about those things.

 

This morning, Sharon got in right around the same time that I did. The office was still pretty empty, so I figured it would be a good time to approach her about getting more work. If she had anything to say about my speed (or lack thereof), at least there wouldn't be an audience.

 

Right as I opened my mouth to ask, I realized the whole speed-thing probably wasn't as big of a deal as I'd made it out to be.

 

Sure enough, Sharon didn't really bat an eye when I asked, except to say, "Are you totally out of work?" I told her I did have a project, but it was over-budget and I wanted to wait for the planning department to get back to us before putting any more work into it. She understood that. She said, "Give me an hour to get settled in and I'll figure something out."

 

She assigned me to a job helping another architect (Ahmed) with a project that he was falling behind on. There is quite a bit of work to be done. I hope she has the budget for it, and that I can bang it out pretty quick! But it will keep me busy and challenged, and that is good.

 

Ahmed pointed out to me that the plans and the elevations didn't align. I was looking over this on my computer when Sharon came to make sure I'd gotten the work I needed. I pointed out the discrepancy to her. She said, "I think you're misreading the plans. Check the street views."

 

I knew I wasn't misreading the plans, but I told her I'd check the street views and I did. Sure enough, the street views showed that the elevations were right and the plans were wrong. I showed them to Ahmed and the two of us went together to show Sharon.

 

When Sharon saw that there actually was a problem with the plans and elevations, she exclaimed, "Why did you wait until now to show this to me?!" She was looking at both Ahmed and me when asking the question, but I knew she couldn't really be asking me, as I'd literally just started looking at the project.

 

Then she said, "I need time to think about this. You can't come to me and expect an immediate answer to something like this. I need like ten minutes to myself to figure this out."

 

This exchange taught me a little more about Sharon. She's explosive, and there's a reason for the explosiveness, but it's not really focused, and it's not really personal. It's unpleasant, but I could see that she was overwhelmed. She was overwhelmed because they'd had months to discover the error on this job, but it didn't get brought to her until two weeks before the project was due. If she called the client to inform them of the discrepancy at this late hour, they would probably flip out.

 

Now, I don't think it's a useful reaction to explode at people when an ugly problem rears its head. But I do think Sharon's reaction is 1,000,000 times better than Frank's reaction to problems, which is basically him sticking his own head up his ass. Sharon actually dealt with the problem. She took some time and came up with a solution.

 

I don't know if Paul's statement about her is fair, that she doesn't know how to manage. She's certainly rough around the edges, but she manages the accounts that are the bread and butter of the company, and I think she's quite good at her job. Just working with her on this one little issue, I can tell she's 10 times the architect that Frank is.

 

You know how Frank would have resolved the problem? He would have said, "You only think this is a problem because you're inexperienced. I can solve this problem in five minutes. It's just lines on paper."

 

He's demented, I swear.

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  • 2 weeks later...

When I was aged 15 - 17, I had a boyfriend who remained the love of my life for many years thereafter: Ed.

 

I was the one who ended our relationship, but I did so because I loved him.

 

I simply wasn't ready to settle down, and I knew that Ed was.

 

I felt that if I stayed with him, I would just become resentful and it would poison an otherwise beautiful relationship.

 

Ed contacted me about 10 years later and we started dating again.

 

He had three kids, Alan, Carrie, and Tim. Carrie and Tim were his. Alan was someone else's kid, but Ed had raised Alan from infancy and considered him to be his own.

 

I loved the kids and I loved Ed, but I just found the whole situation to be too complicated. So, after about 8 months, I broke it off again.

 

Ed and I stayed in touch for about a year afterwards. He'd come over to my mom's house and make small repairs. I used to hang out and help him.

 

One day, I went out with my friend instead of hanging around with Ed as he installed an electrical outlet for my mom. He never came back after that, and we never really spoke again.

 

Years later, I realized that Ed had really been coming over to see me, and that when I left that day instead of hanging out, it closed a door for him.

 

It's sad to think about, even though it ultimately had to happen.

 

I don't think there were any hard feelings on his end. He's just a pragmatist.

 

Anyway, yesterday would have been our 27th anniversary if we had stayed together since I was 15!

 

Ed would have argued with me about the date. He thinks it was in April, but he's wrong.

 

ANYWAY, I realized it at work, and for a moment I imagined what my life might be like if we had stayed together all of these years.

 

I realized that his children never would have been born. That thought made me sad!

 

I was surprised by this because I was only part of their life for a very short period of time, and during that time I was extremely stressed out by the situation.

 

I have tried googling the kids on occasion to see how they've grown. I've also tried googling Ed to see how he's doing. I never found much, and so years passed between the googlings.

 

I actually googled all of them about a week or two ago, one sleepless night. I can't remember how I fell into that particular hole.

 

But I actually found Ed! And I found Tim!

 

I didn't contact them, and I won't. What I have with Arnold is too precious. And I don't want to disrupt whatever Ed has going in his life.

 

But it was so good to see that they are doing ok.

 

It's the first time I've seen any of his kids since Ed and I last broke up, nearly 15 years ago. They are all in their 20s now!

 

Tim looks a lot like Ed did, same jet black hair and bright blue eyes.

 

It was a little like looking back through time, not so much because of the resemblance, but because Ed and I were around that age when we knew each other.

 

It was sort of surreal.

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Another one bit the dust at work! Poor girl. They fired her on the day she returned from vacation.

 

Well, I could kind of see it coming. She (Farah) sat right behind me and it was obvious that she had a really odd work ethic. It was like she felt zero urgency to complete the tasks assigned to her. She listened to podcasts all day and made a lot of personal calls. Also, she made a lot of dumb errors that other people had to correct.

 

Farah actually worked at the same place I worked before I came to this company. But she got laid off from there.

 

Now she got fired from here.

 

Farah is a nice girl, but it's time for her to get a clue.

 

I think the straw that broke the camel's back in this case was the fact that she took 8 days off instead of the 5 days she scheduled. The extra 3 days were due to some poor planning on her part related to her travel. Taking those extra 3 days off really screwed up the projects she was working on, and the other people on her team.

 

When Farah came in on Monday, she knew to go directly to Paul's office (Paul is the director of admin/finance/HR). I assume he gave her a talking-to, but she wasn't fired at that point.

 

When she walked by my desk I greeted her and she seemed cheerful.

 

After lunch time, Ivan called Farah into his office. He closed the door. Next thing I knew, Farah was back at her seat and Paul and Justin were standing in her cubicle.

 

I remembered the Justin-Paul combo from when Catherine was fired. I realized it could be termination time for poor Farah.

 

Paul and Justin walked away and I heard Farah quietly shuffling at her desk. Was she packing up her things? The sounds were so quiet, and so intermittent, that I couldn't tell. I didn't want to look, because I didn't want to make things more awkward for her than they probably already were.

 

I heard Justin talking to her. At the moment, I was engrossed in my work and didn't hear what he was saying. The tone of his voice is what caught my attention. It was tight, restricted, and polite. It said to me, "She's definitely fired."

 

Right as I got up to go to the kitchen, Farah got up from her desk to walk past. We nearly collided and I said, "Ooh, sorry!" She was carrying two large bags, stuffed with things. She said, "It's ok," but she didn't look up. She walked in the direction of Paul's office. I guess she exited from that side of the building because she never came back around.

 

It was sort of like when Pratima came in after she'd been fired mid-vacation. She walked through the whole building to get to Paul's office and never came back through.

 

Does the building absorb them?

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  • 3 weeks later...

Well, I still had a job when I returned from vacation this year! So, that anxiety is over.

 

I think there is another lady who may get fired, though: Jolene. She's relatively new, but I get the impression that she is making a lot of errors.

 

In lighter news, they issued an org chart and I am officially working for Mitchell. That makes me happy.

 

Unfortunately, the org chart makes Frank look like the Master of the Universe. Boo.

 

But the org chart also makes it look like Frank is in charge of Ivan and Robert, who own the company along with Mark. So, it's a little misleading.

 

Further irony: Despite the fact that I am officially on Mitchell's team, I am now working for Ivan again!

 

What happened is, my client submitted a completely new floor plan layout for the building we're designing. I spent all of Tuesday and most of Wednesday reviewing it and it's going to take a lot of work to make the concept code compliant. In other words, it's a change of scope. Mitchell and I called the client on Wednesday and fortunately the client understands that the additional work will incur an additional charge. So, my project is on hold while the business development people write up a proposal for the change of scope and negotiations take place.

 

I am working for Ivan until things start rolling again with my project.

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