I usually work alone in a big, well-air-conditioned office in the back of the building. Fine; I’m not exactly gregarious and I can get some work done when nobody is there but can get no work done when I’m forced to interact with others. But the sad part is that I’m totally out of the loop. Tibetan yakherds get the company news before me. Today the email newsletter came out and I saw, hidden deep in its bowels, that our Florida rep had been “let go.” Yep, those very words; two words I have never seen together on any official company document; two words never uttered publicly by any Human Resources or Marketing person (the newsletter is put out by Marketing because we’re too small for a real HR department); the very embodiment of political incorrectness. He is not “seeking other opportunities.” He was “let go.” With cause, but that’s not relevant to this.
I was saddened by this news because, learning about it too late and working many hundreds of miles from his office, I was unable to share, or at least observe, his pain. Yet, I am heartened that I was not forced by proximity in time and space to make sympathetic comments as he put his shit in a box.
You people who have come to know me know the crusty personna I have adopted, both online and in real life, conceals a tender heart; a soul devoted to liking, or at least getting along with, everybody. This is especially true in my relationships with coworkers. Every person has something about them that makes them likeable; something that shows they are worthy of our tolerance; something that makes worthwhile the effort of pretending to like them until I can find that nugget of likeability.
Except Doug. That pompous, santimonious, egotistical, bucket of week-old offal was the first person I have worked with in decades to instantaneously inspire my detestation. I thought about it and realized that I was in his presence perhaps a total of two hours, which worked out to wanting to punch him, on average, every seven and a half minutes.
The challenge now will be to hold my tongue while flying to the convention on Friday so as not to ask the president why he hired that clown in the first place.