I wonder how old I’ll be when I'm comfortable standing up for myself. Last night, I woke up three times from dreams of driving off a cliff or a winding road or a dead-end road. When I looked up the meaning to see if there was something I should know, I found out two things:
Driving indicates being on a life/purpose journey and making progress. Driving off a cliff indicates being frustrated because of loss of recognition or rewards or personal power.
Dead-on.
The contract company for which I work right now professes to be the number one IT consulting firm in North America but seems to thrive on hiring unqualified and unintelligible people from India. I thought these times had passed, but apparently they haven’t yet learned that it costs more, in the long run, to hire an Indian than it does to hire an American.
People were moved around last week and three Indians were moved into the 15 X 15 lab I’ve been in. No problem under normal circumstances, but there are no windows and no air circulation, just body odors and HEAT.
I’ve learned that they like the heat set to at least 80 degrees, because they’re not used to the cold. “Allergic to the cold” is the phrase that was used. THAT they could express in understandable English.
Driving off a cliff.
It’s not politically correct, I know. I’m intelligent and have been exposed to a lot in my day, so I know my civilized reaction should be to accept cultural differences and celebrate and learn from them.
But working for this number one IT consulting firm has become a little like working the McDonalds drive-thru. Although, there, I’d at least get some fresh air.
So, I voiced my opinion; I asked to be moved; I asked to turn down the air (which they conveniently didn’t understand no matter how enthusiastically I pointed to the thermostat and acted out my discomfort); and then I asked to at least move next to the door where they had set up shop. (I should have just turned the air down, but it wouldn’t have solved anything. The especially stinky boy with the sweater draped across his chair constantly complained of being cold.)
In return, I got pitiful looks and hushed conversations in their native tongues about (I have no doubt) how miserable I must be to be the meanest, most horrible person in the world.
Driving off a cliff again.
No control, no power. And the queasy feeling that I’ve asked for too much, that I’ve expressed too much opinion.
I feel the doom of this project that started out so well. And I’m driving off cliffs in my sleep because of yet another impossible office space/cubicle/payroll FREAK situation, ignoring God and knowing I’m not where I belong.
Although, each FREAK does end up in my Freakish Magnetism chronicle. Not exactly power, but internal passive-agressive progress.