Guys, I don’t know what to do. (I’m pretty sure there’s nothing I can or should do, which is way worse.) A purely professional issue has become personal between a coworker and me, and it sucks.
It started with me screwing up, big time. I’ve got some time management issues that I’m working on my own to resolve. (My post count is my cite.) I’d been letting one major long-term project and one minorish intermittent one sit there - hadn’t worked on either in a long time. Also, there were two tasks that don’t take a long time to do but are pretty complicated and important that I’d left undone for the stupid, stupid, stupid reason that I’d forgotten how to do them and didn’t get around to asking anybody. Christ, I’m so mad at myself. Anyway, I got called on the carpet about a month ago and raked over the coals for it. In that meeting (a little preview of hell) they sat me down and told me that, and this will be kind of important later, nobody had any complaints about my reference services, dealing with patrons, all my other duties, etc., but that obviously my not completing these projects was unacceptable.
Well, that was basically the kick in the pants I needed - I’ve worked out a plan for myself, completed the little projects, made tons of progress on the big ones - essentially I’m back on track now. (I do realize that now I have to be, like, six times as good to make people forget about how bad I screwed up.) That’s not the problem, though. (I should mention at this point that, in good professional practice, nobody but us professional staff in this department, meaning four people, were in on that meeting. As it should be.)
The afternoon after I’d had the Terrible, Awful, No Good Meeting, we had a staff meeting. So D already knows about my fucking up. At the meeting, we had a legitimate professional disagreement about service levels, our appropriate roles, consistent service, etc. Now, nobody would call me a lazy librarian (or so I thought!), but because I have honestly differing viewpoints from her on certain service issues, she clearly thinks that I am. Additionally, I said a few things too personally directed at her (she coddles patrons and breaks our rules for them and does everything for them so they don’t have to learn to do anything and then they come in on a busy weekend and are shocked that not everybody does.) which was not only inappropriate but also a huge mistake. I blame it on having the worst day of my professional life, but obviously that’s no excuse.
So, D is PISSED. The next morning, I tried to apologize to her and talk about it, but she wasn’t having any of it. Now, I was brought up to accept apologies even if I didn’t feel like it, to meet people halfway, to speak rationally about problems… I guess not everybody was. So she cut me down, told me “sorry isn’t good enough, grrr grr grr”, and I decided not to poke the bear.
After a few days of her hovering over my shoulder like a vulture waiting for me to screw up and humiliating me in front of the patrons and the new staff member at any possible turn and sending me the nastiest e-mails in tone I’ve ever gotten (oh, but if you didn’t know what was going on, you wouldn’t see the seething hate in them, that’s the problem) I tried talking to her again. And let me tell you, I had the sweetest most honeyfied speech to give, all about how I really respected her and am so upset that she’s mad at me and am crushed to think she might think I’m a bad librarian (all true), and then she interrupts me and tell me that I am a bad librarian, that I really let the department down, etc, etc, etc. Her nod to “nice” was “I hope you improve, I really do.” I mean, jesus. I don’t think anybody I really know has ever spoken like that to me as an adult! I have no idea how I didn’t burst into tears, I really don’t. (I’m an easy crier, but I guess I have an animal instinct not to show throat to the talons of evil!)
So I yelled at the BF for talking me into trying to talk to D again - share the love, eh?
I was so upset over all this I finally went in to see my boss about it, because I thought, maybe everybody else is just pretending that I get a second chance and that they still like me and all, and if everybody really does think I’m a bad librarian, I really need to start seeking alternate employment. (Not exactly possible in a town with a library school, I might add. Plus I like my job, and I’m good at it!) Well, she tells me I’m crazy and of course everybody loves me and nobody thinks I’m a bad librarian, why would I think that? Well, I tell her D certainly seems to, 'cause she told me to my face, but I didn’t want the boss to step in or anything. Honestly, I really do think the boss wasn’t just trying to be nice - I came out of that meeting thinking that it was just a personal matter between me and D. So when that afternoon D dragged me into an empty office to “talk it out”, which was her way of saying “enumerate all the reasons I think you’re shitty at your job”, I let it roll off me.
I’ve given up on D. I decided I’d just be nice to her and let her hate me as much as she wants to. It’s easier said than done, though. Sometimes she’s perfectly civil, almost as if she wasn’t raised by wolves or something, and sometimes she sends e-mail with that nasty tone, but whatever. She’s always waiting for me to fuck up, of course, and working on desk with her is a private little horror, but I try not to let it get to me. I say I won’t let her live rent-free in my head, but damn, it’s hard, you know?
So last night I find out for sure what I’ve been suspecting - she’s been filling everybody’s ears with what a shitty librarian I am. Prolly because she’s a stunningly unprofessional bitch, I guess. She likes to be Superlibrarian - here on all her days off, has her special little patrons, etc, etc, etc, and she loves to lord it over everybody else. (One of her examples in her little empty-office tirade to me about how lazy I am? “When I came to the desk today, the printer was almost completely out of paper.” “Well, I’m glad to know you’ve never left a printer without its full complement of paper supples.” “No, I don’t think I have.”) I’m sure she’s poisoning the new girl against me, and she’s definately badmouthed me to people in other departments.
The thing is, she is a good librarian, with a good reputation, and she’s been here a lot longer than I have. What if people believe her? It’s all very well to say “Prove it with your work”, but don’t pretend that hearing bad things about a person doesn’t affect your opinion of them even if you try not to listen to gossip. And it isn’t just gossip, it’s a respected person’s professional opinion! The BF asked me, “Don’t you have any allies at that place?” Well, I didn’t know I needed allies - didn’t know I had enemies! And no, I really don’t - I have “work friends”, but they’re all her work friends too and she’s known them a lot longer than she’s known me. I only have one or two real “allies”, part time non-professionals, and I’m sort of thinking she’s actually taking this shit with me out on them! Can’t prove anything, though. And it’s not like I can go around telling people “Whatever D said about me, it isn’t true” - for one thing, I’m better than that, and for another thing, even if I weren’t, who’d believe me? I did, in fact, fuck up big time, after all.
I don’t want to go to the boss lady about it - can’t prove anything, and I really am the one who screwed the pooch, and this is a very small department. It’s easy to say “Tell management”, but it isn’t always that cut and dried in actuality. I mean, who knows what my boss actually thinks about the whole thing? And it would only make it worse to have her talk to D, obviously. I mean, there’s nothing that can be done unless somebody invents a retroactive “good breeding” ray gun.
Sigh, I’m sorry if any of you are still reading this, but it’s just gotten to me. It’s worn me out. I dread going to work sometimes, a job I theoretically love! I’m completely depressed about the whole thing. Working at the desk with her is a short season in hell, and working in the back when she’s at her desk near mine is an exercise in paranoia. What do you do with an interpersonal situation like this? (She’s nowhere near retirement.) I’ve tried leaving it alone, since that’s really the only option, but she’s not leaving it alone - it’s been a month and she’s generally normal to my face, but obviously not to my back. What the hell am I supposed to do now?
