"Faint Heart Never Won Fair Lady" (old story/very mild rant)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Something that happened to me over 5 years ago sometimes comes into my mind, so I thought I’d write about it here. It’s just one of those things that I still think about now and then.

I used to work at this place which had this one lady, a seasonal employee (usually worked probably 5-9 months of the year, I’m guessing) who was sort of a character. I liked her a lot (we were both artists and had a lot of common interests), but she had kind of a way about her that could be frustrating at times.

Anyway, one day at work a phone call came into our department. It was for this lady (I’ll call her B). Some guy wanted to talk to B. I cheerfully said, “B isn’t here right now, could you call back later?” or something like that. The guy said okay and that was it. I didn’t think much of it.

Well, when I told B of her phone message later on, she hit the ceiling. Apparently I’d ruined her life. You see, the guy who called was a fellow she met on the bus, and they were getting friendly. He’d asked her for her phone number, but since she’d chosen not to have a phone at home (just never wanted one, or decided she couldn’t afford one) she gave him the work number. So, she told me, “He’ll never call back now. He’ll think I’m trying to avoid him. He’ll be too timid to call again. WHY DIDN’T YOU ASK HIM FOR HIS NUMBER?!?! That’s what you’re supposed to do!!!”

Well, I felt terrible, but I couldn’t see how forgetting to ask the guy’s number equated ruining her life. (I should add here that this lady didn’t get a lot of guys falling all over her and she really liked this guy, so perhaps she saw him as the only potential boyfriend she’d have in a long while.)

I felt bad because I liked her and almost felt like she couldn’t get a break—here she meets a guy that she likes and who likes her, and now apparently it’s all blown. But what the hell? If things are so fragile between them that he can be scared away so easily, what was the point? I said to her, “Well, a faint heart never won a fair lady” meaning, a guy can’t be scared away that easily if he wants to get the girl. For some reason this seemed to comfort her somewhat, but I think she still thought that I’d ruined her life. I never did find out if the guy ever found a way to get in touch with her as I think she was laid off a while after that or something.

I don’t know why I felt the need to share that. I guess a part of me still feels guilty. But another part of me thinks, “What the hell?” And another part still just wants that lady to be happy and I feel bad that I may have done something (innocently) to prevent some small part of happiness for her. But how was I to know that so much hinged on that one call, and how am I responsible for her not having a phone? Oh well, I dunno . . .

Has anyone else had one of these dumb things happen to them, where it sticks in their memory for years later? If so, please share. I’m sure I’m not the only one.

2

“A faint heart never won a fair lady.”

Ever notice how the knight in shining armor or Prince Charming never really have to woo the lady? It’s slay a dragon, heimleich some apple out of her throat, or own an kingdom and the wome will line up for marriage. That’s because it is easier to slay dragons, save lives, and obtain divine right than it is to woo a woman.

Though, I don’t think you did the wrong thing.

My dumb thing:
When I was at school out west, I sat to read on a bench on campus one sunny day. It turned out that quite a few black students congregated around that bench, though none actually sat down next to me initially. At one point this black woman approached and sat down. She appeared to be friendly with the others there. After a couple of minutes she turned to me and asked me to watch her stuff while she ran in a nearby building to run an errand. No problem. A couple of folks who overheard her made light humor about absconding with her stuff, but it was hassle-free as one would expect.

For some reason, I’ve always kind of wondered why she chose to ask me, a complete stranger, to watch her stuff when all around us were people she seemed to be on friendly terms with—friendly acquaintances at the very least. I can’t help but think that it reflects more on me: All else equal, if everybody in the story where white, then I might have never thought anything of it. But then agian, maybe not, because I can’t really assume my WASP instincts apply equally to all and that other societal subsets may be more gregarious to strangers in a way that looks like being on friendly terms to me. (Shrinks have to watch that they don’t mis-diagnose some Native Americans for lack of affect, when culturally they tend to be less outwardly emotional.)

That’s my story.

3

Um, if it was really that important, why didn’t she tell you she might be getting an important phone call? And if she was so worried that he would bolt, she could have asked for his number, also.

Love sucks, really. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could just flip a switch and turn your crushes off? “I am interested in you romantically,” you say, and if the other person said, “I’m sorry, I’m not interested,” then you flip the switch and turn it off, and you are not lost in anguish at love lost, and the other person isn’t freaked out about you carrying a torch, because they know you switched off.

Or, uh, something.

4

No, yosemite, you weren’t wrong. What are you, a mind-reader?

My story:

When I was about 19 or so, I was working at one of my very first jobs. It was a small office, and the only other clerical person there was a much older woman. I was not close to her at all. This woman was sort of a strange character – very phobic about just about everything, including dentists. Her teeth were all loose in their sockets and they wiggled visibly when she spoke to you. ::shudder:: And her boyfriend was a psycho, too. When he phoned the office to speak to her, I’d ask who was calling, and he’d go ballistic on me for presuming to ask his identity.

Unfortunately, while I was working there, her mother died. The first day she came back after the funeral, she put her head down on my shoulder and cried hysterically. I was absolutely bewildered and even rather frightened – I was so young, and here was this 60-something, unfamiliar and mildly psycho woman suddenly using me as a crying pillow. I was so startled that I couldn’t express any sympathy. It really gave me a turn, and I think it instilled in me a bit of an inhibition in my ability to express sympathy towards other people when they are grieving. I’m trying to get over that to this day, and also the guilt that I couldn’t comfort her the way she wanted.

5

Why didn’t she get the guy’s number herself when she met him? “I’m sorry, I don’t have a home phone right now. Can I have your number and I’ll call you from work sometime?”

6

Yosemite, I wouldn’t worry about it, but for future reference when answering the phone in a business setting it is more polite to say, “That person isn’t available right now, can I take your number and have her call you back”, rather than putting the onus on the caller to call back.

7

Wow! You’re a genius! Can you imagine the millions of person-years of grief that could have been averted just in the 20th century alone?

8

Well, I see I’m not the only one with weird stories that still haunt them!

I guess that’s always been true, hasn’t it? :slight_smile:

Yeah, exactly! If she has no phone, she knows that getting calls and communicating with people is going to be extra troublesome. With something that was apparently so terribly important, why rely on someone else (me, as it happened) exclusively? Why stake your whole future (it’s almost the way it seemed at the time) on some other yahoo (me), assuming that they’d do the “expected” thing?

:shudder: from me too. Double shudders! I’ve seen some people with really crappy teeth (as in half there, rotting out of their head) but never wiggling! Horrible!

I would not worry about dealing with the grieving so much—most people don’t cry on virtual strangers’ shoulders like that. Most of what we want when we’re grieving is to be listened to if we feel like talking, and not be treated like we’re lepers when we don’t “snap out of” the grief in a short amount of time. (It can take a year or so to start feeling normal again.) There really isn’t much else anyone else around can do.

Well—I probably would have thought to do that if I had been in the reception area or anywhere where outside calls were taken. But I was in the “warehouse” area (we were low on the totem pole) and we always had calls transferred to us. I never took calls from customers—in fact, it was rare that I took calls at all. There was no question that this had to be a personal call for this lady and I needed to get back to my work and just didn’t think about it.

9

My dumb story: When I was in 9th grade, for the first time in my life I was mildly popular. Only mildly, mind, but I let it go to my head. I remember somebody asked me what I thought about some girl I didn’t even know, and I airily replied, “Oh, she’s a b*tch.”

:frowning: Her boyfriend and I had been pretty decent friends up until then, but after that he never spoke to me again. I’ve wished a thousand times at least that I could find her, and tell her how sorry I am.

10

I missed this one:

Exactly! That’s what I would have done! With something apparently this important, I’d think she’d make extra sure that she’d be able to get back to him, rather than hoping that all the people who would take the call, transfer the call, etc. etc., would do everything right.

11

Oh, that is so sad. I know exactly how you feel.

I have a million of those kinds of stories. “If only I could go back and tell so-and-so that I didn’t really mean that the way it sounded.” “If only I could have explained that better.” “If only I hadn’t been such a clueless jerk.”

I don’t even want to start thinking about it. All I can do is pray for good vibes to go out to that person, and that somehow they’ll either forget or in some way be compensated for the hurt or offense that I caused.

12

In this case I can see the guys point. Not having a home phone is incredibly unusual today. If I was meeting a woman and she said she had no home phone, It would trip my suspicion meter heavily. Maybe I’m paranoid, but I would assume she had a boyfriend/husband at home, or at the least was blowing me off. The fact that he actually called the work number at all is a pretty gutsy thing in my book. And if I called and was told she wasn’t there I would figure it was the blow off. As a guy you do have to be a bit wussy these days to avoid being viewed as a creepy stalker.

It’s just a set of circumstances that came together to suck. Unfortunate, but no blame to anyone.

13

Very good point, and I hadn’t thought of that. Perhaps this guy did think that.

There was something about B, though, that I think would make him believe that she wasn’t blowing him off. I think that’s why he did call work—because I think she convinced him that she was genuine. However, you’ve got a point—he possibly chickened out after not being able to reach her, perhaps figuring that he’d be blown off after all, or something.

And if this is so, and B knew this was so (that her phone-less situation would set off guys’ suspicion-meters), then all the more reason for her to ask for his phone number as well, to make sure that she’d be able to reach him.