Kathleen McCall:
Occasional�� Muse�

2002-09-07 - 3:26 p.m.

Running From Office

I had a bad day at work today. I don't have many bad days at work. In fact, this may have been the first one. It wasn't real bad, just kind of bad, but kind of bad in a residual way that leaves you uneasy, like maybe you forgot something important, such as putting on your underwear.

I got involved in office politics and gossip.

OK, in my defense, I didn't get involved. But I listened, which is bad enough. I only have two work rules: Do my job the very best I can, and quietly and absolutely stay away from office politics and gossip. I blew the second one, and in doing so I didn't quite keep the first one, either.

I worked in a large company for a number of years - I know from office politics. I know the alliances and sniping and backstabbing, and I know I want no part of it. Don't want to talk about who is saying what about who or who got what that nobody else got or why management is so whatever. Don't need it. I'm lucky because my job has no lunch or breaks so I don't end up in the common room too often unless I am looking for someone, and I don't have any idle chat time. So it's not so hard to get along with everyone and still stay out of the loop.

Today I got caught.

I'd had an encounter - an interaction, although I hate that word - a few days ago with a co-worker that didn't quite co-work. So when I saw her go in to the break room, I went to straighten it out, get clean with it. It was okay. She gently and viciously put me right in my place, we agreed on how we would do things, and while I don't have any great liking for the woman, I think we're on track. Done.

But later, another co-worker asked me a leading question that told me that SHE knew of the misunderstanding - odd, thought it was a small thing between just two of us - and when I told her we'd straightened it out, she launched this, "Well, I don't have any problem because I've gotten to know you, but SOME people say..."

"Some people." You know what that is, right? That's shooting from behind a rock. I can't argue with some people, can't seek them out and find out why they think this about me. In fact, the odds are good that Some People don't even exist, and the little factoid I got has no meaning at all. Still, it was a yuckky thing to put in my hands, kind of like when the kids were little and they use to spit things they couldn't eat in your hand - remember? - and I haven't got anywhere to put it down. So I left work uneasy, feeling hurt that Some People think negative things about me and apparently discuss them when I'm not around, or that Co-Worker made stuff up to stir the pot and upset me. All of a sudden I don't feel so great about my job, don't feel like bouncing in and smiling and being the best co-worker I can be.

This is why I have to stay away from this stuff. Man, it's toxic.

I HATE being told secondhand stuff for my own good. Don't do that to me. If somebody has a problem with my work, they can certainly come talk to me about it; if they would rather discuss it in the lunchroom, that's fine too, but I don't want to HEAR about it. You can't stay out of office politics by announcing, "I stay out of office politics," like you're too good to be involved in it; you just have to DO it, quietly and calmly. That's what I want to do, what I have been able to do. I'm Switzerland, without the numbered accounts. I like it that way. I want to go back there.

Now I also know that if someone wants to spit in your hand, you don't have to let them. But I'm never expecting it, somehow; if you say, "put out your hand," I'll do it, duhhh. I'll do it every time - I'm the Charlie Brown of hand-spit. And then I can't seem to get rid of it no matter how much I wash in the not-my-problem sink. It's still there, like the MacDonald's Urinal Cake liquid soap, I can smell it: somebody has a problem with the way I do my job, and I don't even know who it is, and it feels uncomfortable.

Can't pursue it, because chasing phantoms turns them real; if there WASN'T trouble, I could make some that way. Can't call a staff meeting and demand, "Okay, who has been talking about me, and what did you say? What's your problem? No one leaves this room until the culprit comes forward. I mean that. If there's more than one of you, you'll have to turn in your friends, too. I want NAMES and I want them NOW." Can't do that. Don't even WANT to do that.

A better-adjusted person would have let this go already, laughed it off, rinsed the spitty hand and gone on with the job. I think I will pretend to be that person.

And I'm sure as hell staying out of that lunchroom.

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