Let's not mince words.
I don't pay attention. A lot of the time it looks like I'm listening, very much like I'm listening. I'm not. I have fairly slow auditory memory decay, so I can pull up the last point that was made and infer like nobody's business, but I'm often not listening.
My best friend from high school once pointed out that when I look most pensive and contemplative is when I'm replaying songs in my head.
"What are you thinking right now?"
"Honey, by Mariah Carey."
So, when you don't listen well, you often don't know what's going on. Luckily, there are usually people around who do pay attention so that I can ask questions like, "So, where are we going next?"
That's all I really need to know in life. "What happens after this?" I'm golden.
As an aside, I'm just now realizing that for people who, like me, often aren't listening to your rules and justifications, we often just think about what makes sense and works best for us. How in this system can I best get my needs met. Non-listeners like me are SO frustrated by bureaucracies, SO frustrated! Because, we haven't even heard your bullshit justifications, all we know is that what's going on makes absolutely NO sense. Non-listeners, we're silly.
So, my cattle-herding, one-size-fits-all, orientation started yesterday and today we were suppose to have breakfast provided for us.
Where would a non-listener go for breakfast? Well the same place that we met all damn day yesterday, of course!
Wrong!
Went to meet with my peeps, and unbeknownst to me, I crashed the food service workers appreciation breakfast. So there I was, sitting at a table eating yogurt and slowly realizing that I was in the wrong space. No one said a word to me, and after I realized that this was the wrong crowd, I decided to shovel that yogurt down my throat as fast as I could and get out of there. But, a few things occurred to me:
1.) What the fuck!?!? Do I look like a food service worker??? How come no one said anything to me? Are they just that kind and welcoming? Are they just that broken and intimidated that no one would dare say anything in their appreciation breakfast with only 30 people in the room? I can think of plenty of other campus groups that would have gladly tapped me on the shoulder and started asking me questions!
2.) Yeah, I guess mostly just that.
So, as I left the appreciation breakfast (oh! Uhm, can we do better for the fucking cafeteria workers than some bagels, yogurt, and fruit for Christ's Sake? Jeesus Christ! These fucking people slave away and deal with shitty attitudes and snobbery every fucking day; it's a thankless job for real. and to appreciate them they get a breakfast that could be confused for a grad student free continental ... What the fuck people? What's the problem, no one to cook?
So, as I was leaving, I realized that I had absolutely No idea where I was going and what I was suppose to be doing when I got there.
I don't need you to give me lots of information verbally; I'm just gonna tune you out and give you a cavalcade of "uh-huhs" that process through your words as though I'm engaged, but I'm not. That doesn't help anyone.
What I need from you organizer people of the world is a note of some sort when I show up in the logical place that says, "Hey! We thought you may come here. Today you need to go to room 345. Oh! And when you get there, be prepared to teach a brief lecture. We told everyone else about it yesterday when they were listening."
I don't pay attention. A lot of the time it looks like I'm listening, very much like I'm listening. I'm not. I have fairly slow auditory memory decay, so I can pull up the last point that was made and infer like nobody's business, but I'm often not listening.
My best friend from high school once pointed out that when I look most pensive and contemplative is when I'm replaying songs in my head.
"What are you thinking right now?"
"Honey, by Mariah Carey."
So, when you don't listen well, you often don't know what's going on. Luckily, there are usually people around who do pay attention so that I can ask questions like, "So, where are we going next?"
That's all I really need to know in life. "What happens after this?" I'm golden.
As an aside, I'm just now realizing that for people who, like me, often aren't listening to your rules and justifications, we often just think about what makes sense and works best for us. How in this system can I best get my needs met. Non-listeners like me are SO frustrated by bureaucracies, SO frustrated! Because, we haven't even heard your bullshit justifications, all we know is that what's going on makes absolutely NO sense. Non-listeners, we're silly.
So, my cattle-herding, one-size-fits-all, orientation started yesterday and today we were suppose to have breakfast provided for us.
Where would a non-listener go for breakfast? Well the same place that we met all damn day yesterday, of course!
Wrong!
Went to meet with my peeps, and unbeknownst to me, I crashed the food service workers appreciation breakfast. So there I was, sitting at a table eating yogurt and slowly realizing that I was in the wrong space. No one said a word to me, and after I realized that this was the wrong crowd, I decided to shovel that yogurt down my throat as fast as I could and get out of there. But, a few things occurred to me:
1.) What the fuck!?!? Do I look like a food service worker??? How come no one said anything to me? Are they just that kind and welcoming? Are they just that broken and intimidated that no one would dare say anything in their appreciation breakfast with only 30 people in the room? I can think of plenty of other campus groups that would have gladly tapped me on the shoulder and started asking me questions!
2.) Yeah, I guess mostly just that.
So, as I left the appreciation breakfast (oh! Uhm, can we do better for the fucking cafeteria workers than some bagels, yogurt, and fruit for Christ's Sake? Jeesus Christ! These fucking people slave away and deal with shitty attitudes and snobbery every fucking day; it's a thankless job for real. and to appreciate them they get a breakfast that could be confused for a grad student free continental ... What the fuck people? What's the problem, no one to cook?
So, as I was leaving, I realized that I had absolutely No idea where I was going and what I was suppose to be doing when I got there.
I don't need you to give me lots of information verbally; I'm just gonna tune you out and give you a cavalcade of "uh-huhs" that process through your words as though I'm engaged, but I'm not. That doesn't help anyone.
What I need from you organizer people of the world is a note of some sort when I show up in the logical place that says, "Hey! We thought you may come here. Today you need to go to room 345. Oh! And when you get there, be prepared to teach a brief lecture. We told everyone else about it yesterday when they were listening."
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