mary.kanaku

Because I can’t shut-up even though experience tells me it would be wise to do so.

Why don’t I not-shut-up some more and tell you about it…

I just came home from a meeting at work. One of our team leaders gave a sort of long speech which can be summarized in three points: (listed from her POV)

1. I have assessed the team’s performance and at the rate we’re going, we’re not going to finish The Grand Plan.
2. Rather than have An Epic Failure, we have to abandon The Grand Plan for now and work on The Little Plan.
3. I’m not going to be around when you finish The Grand Plan, which was MY grand plan. And I SO wanted to be part of that! But I’ll feel like an ass if I do it by myself right now, because I want it to be a learning experience for you, to be involved in the development.

She was saying all this and trying not to cry because (I believe) that project was very important to her. And what was I doing? I was clenching my fists under the table, trying to remember Bob Monkhouse jokes to avoid crying. You see? You see now what an ungrateful little swine I am?

Actually, I was uncomfortable and already burning in my self-made, bad-employee hell. Because I don’t want ANYONE to sacrifice something major (like a life’s dream) for me. And I don’t enjoy listening to someone explaining why they chose to do so in detail. Not when they’re close to tears in front of emotionally incapacitated men. Not when I’m three seats away, smiling like an idiot but all the while telling myself “I’m not going to cry I’m not going to cry I’m not going to cry”.

But when she got to the part where (I assumed) she was going to do something drastic, like resign or give up Her Grand Plan to train us instead, or cry in front of us (her subordinates), I just HAD to do something. Like raise my hand and tell her:

I don’t mind not being part of the plan. You should finish it. It was your dream, after all. I won’t take it away from you. I’m still young. I can do other things and I’ll be damned if you have to sacrifice that for me. When you already gave me to much by hiring me in the first place. Me, a pretend-web-developing-chemical-engineer-in-disguise who doesn’t know what MVC means. *sobs*

That’s a very charming, honest speech if I may say so myself, and if I pulled it off, I at least would have made up for not-shutting-up by cheering her up or persuading her to go on with her Grand Plan.

Unfortunately, after I raised my hand and interrupted her speech, I forgot everything I was going to say, and the rest of the team got the condensed version of my Planned Speech:

Ma’am, aren’t you going to ask us… *gulps* whether we want to do The Grand Plan without you? *pause and sniff* B-b-because, I think… you sh-should still do it. B-because, it’s important… to.. *sniff* deliver The G-grand *sob* Plan to… the people w-who.. expect it. *MEGA-sniff and waterworks here*.

Yes. I just stuttered and sobbed like an idiot. Nice going, mary… Whatever happened to the I-won’t-take-that-away-from-you speech??? I swear… those 20 seconds of speech are now in the Top 20 Most Embarrassing Seconds of my life. Still, it seemed to have done the trick… Whether it was my reassurance that we won’t hold her decision against her or just the sight of me stuttering and sniveling like an idiot, she managed to wrap-up the meeting more composedly after my little comedy act.

And by the way, the whole point of her speech was to tell us that she has decided to compromise by letting us finish the project by ourselves with her staying on as Adviser/Consultant of The Grand Plan. So there was no need to worry after all. I made an idiot of myself in front of the whole team for nothing.

Will I ever learn the Art of Shutting Up?