Recently a very distant young relative posted this meme on her Facebook page.
Tag: communication
The Thing About IQ
I know a boy who despairs because his IQ isn’t as high as he’d like it to be. He thinks he’s doomed to failure. He thinks he’s stupid.
I heard in passing on NPR today (sorry, couldn’t tell you who said it or on which program) that IQ is not as good an indicator of academic success as discipline is. Someone who has a lower IQ and perseveres, gets his or her assignments done on time, and doesn’t put off studying ‘til the last minute is bound to do well. So, boys and girls, don’t let that IQ number get you down.
The reason I feel comfortable even discussing this without an adequate citation is that I’ve seen it with my own eyes. I’ve seen people struggle and plug away at various disciplines and come out on top because they really apply themselves. Their success is hard-won, but it’s still success. I’ve also seen people with genius IQs fail miserably in the working world because they may know their stuff, but they are incapable of communicating with others.
I truly believe that it’s much more important to be well-rounded than it is to be at the top of some arbitrary scale. I’m much more impressed with someone who has a lot of life experience than I am with someone who is so high up in his ivory tower that he cannot see the landscape.
So live your life. Take advantage of any opportunity for a new experience that comes your way. And most of all, don’t let some number dictate who you are or who you can be.
[Image credit: capecodtoday.com]
Incompetence, Thy Name is AT&T
You know, you’d think I’d have learned after writing How to Give Horrible Customer Service, but no. In an area of 1 million people (Jacksonville, Florida) the administration in its infinite wisdom has chosen to only allow two major competitors for our unlimited internet market: AT&T and Comcast.
Comcast service is slow as molasses during peak hours, drops you off line constantly, and while it gives a great introductory rate at first, that price basically triples after the first year. AT&T, on the other hand, “only” doubles its price after the first year. How generous. But for that privilege you have to put up with the worst customer service in the history of mankind. Gee, who to choose?
So despite my horrendous experiences with AT&T in the past, I held my nose and dove back into the vast ocean of ineptitude that is their indifferent and smug bureaucracy. Come with me, dear reader, and hold my hand as I am tossed about on their stormy sea of stupidity. I need you, because when all was said and done, I was forced to dwell on a desert island of internetlessness for seven, count ‘em, seven days. Without you, I’d be forced to talk to a soccer ball like Tom Hanks in Cast Away.
Monday, June 30th, 2014
1:20 pm: I receive the following text message: “AT&T Free Msg: U-verse internet active after 8pm 07-01. See self install guide.”
8 pm? When I ordered this service I told them that I’d no longer have access to internet as of midnight today at my old address, so I was hoping to have it with them on 7/1 so I could stay connected. Now I’ll have to go a whole day without internet? Sigh. Okay, whatever. It’s only a day. Let’s take a look at the self install guide. They say it’s really easy. All you need is a phone jack. It doesn’t even need to be active.
I’m standing in the middle of my new rental place, up to my ears in unpacked boxes and chaos, and it occurs to me… hold on… I haven’t seen a phone jack anywhere. I wander from room to room, my heart sinking. Nope. No phone jack. I go outside. No phone box. And no lines leading to the house from the telephone pole. Seriously? I’ve chosen the one house in the free world with no telephone access?
I call AT&T and tell them I can’t do the self install after all. There are no phone lines whatsoever. They say they’ll send a tech out. Their earliest appointment is the morning of July 2nd. I grit my teeth and say, “Fine, I’ll take it.”
Tuesday, July 1st, 2014
10:43 am: After being up all night because I work graveyard shifts, I am woken up by the following text message: “AT&T U-verse Free Confirmation: Repair scheduled for 07-02 between 8am-Noon.” It then urges me to visit their website for status changes. If I had the ability to visit their website, I wouldn’t be in this fix. And I already knew that the tech was coming tomorrow. They told me that on the phone. So they knew I knew, too. Whatever. Communication is good, I suppose.
I can’t imagine how I would have gone through this week if I had regular working hours. Because as you will see, it took no fewer than FIVE visits before they actually got their act together and provided me with the service that they had absolutely no problem taking my money for. If I had had to stay home from work each time, I’d have been in deep trouble.
Wednesday, July 2nd, 2014
9 am the tech arrives, under the mistaken impression that this is going to be a simple phone jack install. I disabuse him of that notion. He confirms what I’ve been saying all along to everyone, that there is no phone line leading to this house at all, and this is to be a complete install. He talks about placing a cable underground from the pole. I like this idea. No sense in having ugly wires going willy-nilly in your yard if not necessary. I go inside and let him get to work.
45 minutes later I peek out and he’s standing next to his truck, talking on his cell phone. I go out and ask how things are going. He tells me there is a slight problem. There is no signal coming to the telephone pole, so even if he installed everything, it wouldn’t work. So before he can get started, he needs to call an INR tech (whatever that is) to come out and sort out the signal. So he’s closing out his repair ticket, ordering one for the INR tech, and once that guy is done he will come right back out and finish what he, uh… never really started. Not to worry, though, once that line is sorted out, it will only take him about 20 minutes to do his part, and I’ll have internet in no time.
1 pm, the INR tech arrives. Much fiddle farting around and doing things that look complicated. I leave him to his work. At around 2:30, I see he’s on his cell phone. Sigh. I go out for a status update, and he tells me he’s almost done here, and then the other guy can come back. I ask him to knock on my door before he leaves and give me an estimated time of arrival. He says he’ll do so.
3:15 pm I look out and the guy is gone. Oh well, I figure the other guy is on his way. But he’s not there by 6 pm, and I resign myself to the fact that he must be coming in the morning. I try to get some sleep but I’m so irritated, I get 4 hours of sleep before working all night.
Thursday, July 3rd, 2014
I get home from work about 8:20 am, and there’s no AT&T truck out front. Great. Just great. Well, it’s not like these guys are the souls of efficiency. I figure I’ll give them an hour.
9:10 am: I receive the following text message: “AT&T Free Msg: Sorry we were unable to complete your U-verse repair. Still trouble? Please visit att.com/ufix or call 888-485-3310.”
Still trouble? What the hell do you think? I have no phone line! So I call them. I explain everything that has transpired to date. They say they will send someone out. But the next available appointment is tomorrow. Are you kidding me? The guy told me he’d be right back! Sorry, ma’am. That’s the next available appointment. Apparently the INR tech didn’t submit a ticket for the first guy, and the first guy just dropped me like a hot rock.
Fine. I hang up and sleep the fitful sleep of the supremely irritated. Then at 10:39 am, I’m awoken by the following text message: “AT&T Free Msg: Your U-verse repair appt time has changed. Your tech will arrive 07/04 btwn 8 am- Noon.” Again with the visiting of the website for status changes.
Changed? What was it before? For crying out loud. Well, at least I’ll have internet tomorrow. And the office person swears to me that they do work tomorrow, even though it’s a holiday.
Friday, July 4th, 2014
The guy arrives relatively promptly and asks to come in and check it out. I tell them there’s nothing to see. There’s no phone jack, no phone line to the house. Nothing. He is stunned. He seems to be under the impression that he was just coming out to help an idiot customer do her simple self install.
He tells me that he’ll have to do a full install (I know) and that there will, of course, be a fee (We’ll just see about that), but no, he will be doing an above ground cable, not a buried one (Whatever it takes).
But this time I don’t go about my business and let him work in private. I’ve learned. So I sit on my front stoop and watch the show. He goes over to the telephone pole. He opens a container and pulls out a mass of tangled cables that looks like an electric tumbleweed from hell. He takes a photograph with his cell phone and makes a call. He’s on the phone for a long, long time.
He comes over to me and tells me that the INR tech yesterday did not fix the signal problem. Well, actually, he may have, but since he didn’t label which of the 5 cables in that mass of 1,500 cables belongs to my house, he has no way of determining which ones to use. So he has scheduled another INR tech to come out to the pole down the block and rewire it entirely. Once that’s done, he’ll come back and set me up.
I say, “You don’t understand. It’s been 4 days. You’re the third person that has reassured me. I still don’t have internet. People probably think I’ve died. I’m afraid that if you leave here, I’m going to be back to square one.” I seriously consider holding the guy hostage.
He tells me not to worry. He says he’s working tomorrow, and that his boss who he was just on the phone with is working tomorrow, too. They will take care of it. He will come back. He leaves. It occurs to me that I can’t even see down the block, so I’ll have no idea when/if the INR tech comes and does his part. And one wonders why I have abandonment issues.
I fall into such a tense and uncomfortable sleep that when I wake up I can no longer raise my left arm without excruciating pain. I work all night like that. Every time I try to move my arm I’m reminded of what a pain this situation has turned out to be
Saturday, July 5th, 2014
I get home at 8:45 am, and again, there is no one out front. I call the phone number and get another indifferent employee. I explain the situation, and she tells me that the INR tech who came out on the second fixed the telephone pole problem, and I explain to her that no, he did not, and they had to send a second one out. She seems quite confused. I tell her in any case, no one has been out here since, it’s been 5 days and 4 techs and yet there is no progress. She says she’ll look into it and call me back.
I want to take a pain pill for my arm, but I’m loathe to do so because I may miss the call. So I toss and turn for 2 hours in considerable discomfort until the phone rings around 10:30 am. She tells me that it appears that the ticket got “lost in the system”. She tells me that she’s place another. She tells me that they work until 8 pm today, and that they also work on Sundays, so someone will be out soon.
5 pm. I call for a status update. Once again I am treated as if this is the first anyone has heard of this situation, and after leaving me on hold for a half hour on my pay by the minute phone, they schedule a technician to come between 4 and 8 pm on Monday. I have to work at that time. My head explodes and I ask to speak to a supervisor. She says that she will have one call me back after hearing me cry tears of utter frustration.
5:50 pm I receive a text. “AT&T U-verse Free Confirmation: Repair scheduled for 07/07 between 4 pm – 8 pm.”
The supervisor never bothers to call back, which tells you all you need to know about AT&T’s utter indifference to customer satisfaction. I am forced to beg my irritated supervisor for Monday off so I can be there when and if someone actually decides to show up and do something.
Monday, July 7, 2014
A brand new tech arrives at 4pm. He has to be brought up to speed, because God knows his company didn’t tell him what was going on. I feel subdued, apathetic and devoid of even an ounce of fight, which is probably just how AT&T wants its customers. But the good news is that this guy, bless him, was able to complete the job, and it only took 2 ½ hours. If I had had the strength to pucker, I’d have kissed him.
So to recap, 7 days with an average of 4 hours of sleep, 1 missed day of work, 5 techs (3 of whom looked me straight in the eye and made promises they had absolutely no intention of keeping), and several rude phone calls later, I’m finally back on line. And I get to pay them an installation fee for the hell they just put me through. They ought to be paying me.
Matter of fact, once I’ve regained my strength, I may try to fight that bill. Yeah. What’s the worst that could happen?
[Image credit: phandroid.com]
Sabotaged Dreams
The beauty of getting into a relationship later in life is that your character is already well established, so there should be no confusion as to who you are. The older you are, the more apt you will be to know your goals and dreams, and if you properly articulate them to your partner, you should be able to quickly determine if the two of you are heading in the same direction.
That’s the theory, anyway. The problem with that theory, it turns out, is that not everyone is honest. I didn’t get that memo.
Many, many years ago I got into a relationship and told him my lifelong goal was to relocate to the mountains of North Carolina. “Great idea!” he said. “Let’s do that,” he said. He even started going to college so he’d be more likely to be employable when the time came. I was thrilled.
About 3 semesters in he decided to change his major. No problem. Everyone has a right to change his mind. A semester after that, he “forgot” to register for the next semester by the deadline. I marked my calendar so that wouldn’t happen again, believe you me.
After one semester off, back he went. The following semester he told me he was quitting because they were requiring him to buy some expensive equipment. “How expensive?” I asked. $99.
The hell???
He had pretty much painted himself into a corner by that point. He had to admit that he didn’t want to go to North Carolina. In fact, he never wanted to leave Jacksonville. He just went to school to stall me in hopes that I’d change my mind. He had no real hopes and dreams of his own. He was just status quo guy. Our relationship ended after 16 years for a whole host of reasons, but lying to me and sabotaging my dreams just to keep me was a huge one.
After that I met a roofer who had so many dreams that it was hard to keep up with him. What a wonderful, wild ride that was. Too bad it was cut short. It’s impossible to know where it would have gone, but at least it was going somewhere.
[Image credit: successfulworkplace.org]
The Beauty of Words
The words you choose can be seductive. They expose your wit, your intelligence, your creativity and your charm without you having to come right out and declare that you have those qualities. And it often seems that the most fetching expressions are those that are rarely used. That’s a pity.
I love delicious repartee. I do not require adulation, only droll parlance. Entice me with your bonhomie and you will win my veneration. I will hold you forever in my high esteem.
I long to hear words that aren’t often uttered. Circumnavigate. Meander. Peruse. Trifle. Blunder. Toothsome. Pulchritude. Thoroughfare. I would prefer a good turn of phrase to a dozen roses any day.
Here is the very key to me: I can be easily ensorcelled (my favorite word of all) by your pithy commentary. Cogitate upon that if you so desire.
[Cartoon stolen, with the utmost admiration, from http://gustavtjgaard.wordpress.com/ ]
Messages in Bottles
Last month a German fisherman pulled the world’s oldest known message in a bottle from the Baltic Sea. It was tossed into the water back in 1913, and contained a postcard that included the writer’s home address in Berlin. Due to water damage, the rest of the message is illegible, but work will soon be under way to restore it. Read more about this here.
What is it about messages in bottles that intrigue us so? I think it is partly due to the random nature of them. We are leaving it up to fate as to whether these messages will ever be received. It also has a lot to do with history. We enjoy receiving personal messages from a bygone era.
But more than anything, I think messages in bottles speak to our desire to leave a mark upon this world. We all want to say we were here, we existed. We led unique lives and loved people and our time on earth counted for something.
Time capsules do much the same thing, but are more likely to be discovered. I’ve left a few of those buried in the ground on the property of the home I used to own. It will be interesting to see if they are ever found.
Now I’m thinking of putting a message in a bottle. What should I say? I will have to give that some serious thought. If I do it, I’ll be sure and post it here, because in a way, this blog is my personal message in a bottle. I send greetings out to the world each day and I have no idea who will read them. I also have no idea how long they will float along in cyberspace and on what shores these blog entries will wash up.
Hello, dear reader. My name is Barbara and I really do exist.
[Image credit: flickr.com]
Trapped in Seat 19A
Whenever I have to fly somewhere, I always struggle with what is the proper amount of social interaction with the stranger who is jammed into the seat next to me. I don’t want to be rude and aloof and thus make the trip uncomfortable, but neither do I want to invite a running commentary that leaves me a captive victim for an interminable flight of hellish boredom.
Case in point, the woman who was sitting behind me on my most recent flight. She made the mistake of saying, “How are you doing?” to the woman next to her. For the next two hours, she was treated to a running commentary, occasionally peppered with her defeated uh huh’s and one brief shining respite when the flight attendants came through with the beverage cart and threw the single peanut into the aisle for all of us to fight over.
The rest of the time, all of us in earshot were subjected to the following:
- Every job she had since she was 17 years old.
- Every place she lived her entire life.
- Full details of when, how, and why her mother died in 2005.
- Every detail of her job as an architectural consultant.
- Even more detail about her current project.
- The fact that she decorates wedding cakes as a hobby.
- A photograph of every single wedding cake she has ever decorated, with details about how the flavors and colors were chosen, and how each cake was constructed. Oh, and did I mention she had done the grooms cakes, too?
- The entire plot of the current book she was reading.
- Details of a political scandal in her town in which someone was murdered, everyone knew who did it, and yet no one would ever be brought to justice.
- Her nephew’s rise to stardom in the soccer championships.
If I had been caught in a bear trap next to this woman, I’d have gladly chewed off my own arm just to get away. Since I was sitting a row ahead of her, fortunately I didn’t have to pretend to be interested. I could attempt to read my book and block out her babble. But that woman next to her was trapped. I felt very sorry for her. She was clearly suffering. Her uh-huh’s became more feeble as the flight droned on.
The thing is, boring people have no idea how boring they are. If they did, they’d stop. Obviously. But that makes me wonder if I bore people. There are a few telltale signs, of course.
- If you are doing all the talking, odds are the other person does not want to participate.
- If you come away from the conversation having learned nothing new yourself, it was clearly not a two way street in terms of communication.
- If you are pelting a total stranger with intimate details, you might want to dial it back.
- If people you know see you coming and cross the street to avoid you, that might be a red flag.
If you really feel like telling the world every intimate detail about yourself, here’s a concept: start a blog. Then you can say whatever you want, and all your friends and family can pretend to read it without ever really reading it. Win/win.
[Image credit: icareifyoulisten.com]
Words of Encouragement and Emotional Support
I was just talking to a friend of mine and she told me a story. When her husband was in hospice, his mother would talk to him on the phone but would never tell him she loved him. In fact, in the 60 years he had been on the planet, she had never told him. Not even once.
One day after one of those phone calls, which the son ended by saying, “I love you, Mom”, and the mother ended by saying “Bye”, my friend went barging into her mother-in-law’s room and said, “What is WRONG with you? Why can’t you tell your own son that you love him?”
She replied, “He knows I love him.”
“No, Mom, actually, he doesn’t. He’s your only child and he’s dying. You should be rocking him in your arms. You should be telling him that you love him. You should be telling him you are proud of him. The fact that you aren’t doing so just shows what a cruel and heartless old shrew you are.”
The woman didn’t say a word. She stayed in her room the rest of the evening and then went to sleep. The next day she woke up and called her son and told him she loved him. And she did so every day for the next several weeks until he finally died. And it meant everything to him. It’s all he had ever wanted from her.
This is not an isolated incident. There are a lot of people out there who think that their actions are enough, that they don’t have to reinforce them with words. Yes, that man’s mother had fed him and clothed him and sent him off to school and made him chicken soup when he had a cold. Yes, those are forms of love. She never neglected his needs and she wasn’t physically abusive toward him, and he turned out to be a good person. Maybe that should be enough.
But why is it so hard to add just one more simple thing to the mix, the one thing that costs not one penny, and takes no physical effort at all? Words of encouragement. Words of support. Confirmation of love.
Here are some words that are worth more than gold, that I, personally, have longed to hear on more than one occasion:
- I admire you.
- I have faith in you. Don’t give up.
- I’m proud of the life that you live.
- I love you so much.
- You are my favorite person on earth.
- You have always been there for me. Thank you.
- I want to be just like you when I grow up.
- You are doing a good job.
- I’m so glad you are a part of my life.
- Thank you for all you’ve done. I know it hasn’t been easy.
- I’m a better person for having known you.
- I think of you often, and I smile.
- I appreciate all that you do.
- You can do it.
- I’m proud to be seen with you.
- I like your style.
- You are a good person.
- I always look forward to seeing you.
- You mean the world to me.
- You make a difference in my life.
- Thank you for everything you’ve taught me. It hasn’t gone unnoticed.
If you just chose one of these phrases a day and said it to someone who is a part of your life, whether it be a friend, a relative, a neighbor or a coworker, it would take less than 3 seconds of your time, but you would see a positive change in your relationships.
So the next time you feel the urge to tease someone or take them for granted, try this instead. The next time you feel the urge to close yourself off or withhold affection, try this instead. The next time you THINK something positive but don’t have the courage to share it, try this instead. The next time you say something nice ABOUT someone but not TO them, try this instead. Think of it as an experiment if you must. It might feel awkward at first, and it may make you feel vulnerable, but it will be the best thing you’ve ever done in your life, and you’ll be amazed at the positive feedback you’ll receive.
You can do it. I have faith in you.
[Image credit: booooooom.com]
Revenge Porn
My, my, I’ve led a sheltered life. I hadn’t even heard of revenge porn until this month. For the uninitiated, these are websites predominately directed against women. Men who have been jilted can post the compromising photos they took while still in a relationship, and include detailed stories about their exes, possibly true, possibly outlandish, all to humiliate the women who have moved on for whatever reason.
The saddest part about this is that you can tell just by reading these posts that these women were smart to leave. What woman in her right mind would want to be in a relationship with someone who would resort to posting their private business in a public forum in an effort to ruin her life and cause the maximum amount of pain? Such class. Such dignity. His mother would be so proud.
These men are, frankly, pathetic. I’m not saying that the women in question were saints. I’m sure they inflicted their share of pain. But to resort to a revenge porn site to vent your spleen seems a little bit like throwing a tantrum in the middle of a Walmart. At age 30. Sad. Just sad.
An even more disturbing trend is those sites where women post pictures of other women who have stolen their husbands. They include heartbreaking details, and often hurl abuse at the home wrecker in question. Oddly, the predominant message seems to be that the husband stealer is the only one at fault, and that because of her, an otherwise perfect life has been ruined. The husband never comes off as nearly as culpable.
What strikes me as strange is the implication that the marriage was perfect, full of joy and happiness, until this other woman came along with evil intent. If that’s truly the case, then how was she able to steal him in the first place? I’m not laying all the blame at the feet of the wife for the resulting divorce. I’m just blaming her for not seeing that there must have already been cracks in the foundation of the marriage, whether they were created by her or by her spouse, or, as is usually the case, a complicated combination of the two.
Home wreckers may be poison, but the immune system of the marriage must already be compromised before that poison can become lethal. And frankly, if your man is that easy to steal, you’ll be much better off without him in the long run, and therefore, in an odd way, perhaps the other woman should be thanked. It’s always helpful when someone else offers to haul your garbage to the dump.
These websites are graphic evidence of humanity’s pain, denial, and blatant inability to communicate. I find them depressing, and no good can possibly come from them.
Don’t air your dirty laundry in public, people. It will only make you look like a pig.
Why Bloggers Make Better Lovers
Yeah, yeah, laugh if you most, but if you think about it, the whole concept actually makes a certain amount of sense because making love, when done right, is the ultimate form of communication, and no one loves communicating more than a blogger.
In addition, bloggers tend to be great listeners, because we’re always looking for material. And we love to give people what they want. We are here to entertain, instruct, and maybe learn a little bit ourselves along the way.
So you shouldn’t poo poo this idea. (Okay, ewww. Sometimes I go too far. But that can often be fun, too. Well, not when it comes to poo. Unless you’re into that. But… oh, never mind.)
I think you’ll find that bloggers are also thoughtful, creative, articulate, well informed, and just love to share. They usually know just the right tone to take, and can conjure up the proper atmosphere in any situation. All of these sound like excellent qualities in a lover, if you ask me.
And then there’s the fact that we’re all so smoulderingly sexy.
The only downside to bloggers is that they’ll most likely kiss and tell, so approach us at your own risk. You have been warned.
[Image credit: basicblogtips.com]
The View from a Drawbridge 