Scanning pages upon pages of documents filled my work day. I had little human contact and got up only to use the restroom or to refill my coffee mug. I didn’t realize how little I had used my voice all morning until after noon, when a coworker asked me how I was doing. The answer I provided sounded something like a dying frog. Even I am not entirely sure what my response was supposed to say.
The woman who provided the question is one I do not converse with much. She held a certain space in my mind, meant mostly for the occasional “Excuse me” and such. I believe I held a similar space in her mind, too.
The conversation that proceeded was one I would not have expected. Full of jokes, that one. And funny ones, too! At one point, she even went on to tell me a story about her weekend which had me quite focused and surprised. I learned more about her in six minutes than I have in six months.
In all of us, I believe there are many sides. We can be both captivating and boring; funny and sad; good and bad. Today, I took the opportunity to recognize the strangeness in myself. I began to wonder when and where I have presented both my best and worst selves. I wondered where I could have possibly gone wrong.
All too often, humans are fast to judge one another and to think that the person being judged is a person he or she could never be. But, wait until that moment when a young, skinny bastard steals their parking spaces. Then the Red appears. Maybe the steps away from that red to the doorway of doing something abominable are fewer than what seemed. I know I have had some terrible fantasies in my mind, behind seemingly stupid people, in line at the bank.
I can’t help but to think that maybe we all need to take a step back, sometimes, and really think about situations, before passing judgment. To find out where, really, we went wrong. Placing a finger on one person or group can feel good for the moment, but the problem still exists. Maybe the problem exists in all of us.
I can’t help but to think that maybe, inside me, there is both a prince and a frog. Maybe I need to hold up a mirror and kiss my own reflection to see which one appears before my own eyes. The empowerment of the experiment might be worthwhile. Maybe there is something there I did not expect to see. Or, maybe I will just see Me.
ZACDAQ 