Back in the work force!
3-5-06
I arrived at my first new job in 16 years! I was amazingly calm I was as I walked into this little shop on Bridge Street.
As I mentioned before it is a newsagent. It sells newspapers and lots of assorted magazines, a bit of tourist things and a Hodge-podge of school supplies, wallets, picture frames, toys, greeting cards, puzzles and sweets. They also have some more high-end items like statues and glassware and even a few bits of Irish china. It mostly makes its sales from newspapers, cigarettes and lottery.
I was introduced the first of my co-workers, Ruth who was a tall woman with very black hair. She was standing behind the register, which is a very narrow area to one side of the shop. The shop is in desperate need of a total revamp. It’s not “quaint” it’s just used and abused. Non-sale items are stuffed everywhere. The box’s for the statues and little knick-knack stuff is on top of and under shelves. The extra cards (which are many for some reason) are in wooden box’s that line shelves below the counters and in small cardboard boxes stacked wherever they can fit. At the end of the counter that makes up the register area and the sweets (candy) and ice cream area is a broken copy machine and a small table that makes up the “work area” for stocking and newspaper inventory and such. But even this area is not workable, it is stacked with books, packaging slips and just about everything else that has no home.
The walls are maybe a beige or pale pink or just really old, maybe it was white at one time- but that was many years ago. The carpet is in terrible shape and it seems a waste to even “Hoover” it. Behind the register area are lots of shelves that hold boxes of candy and cigarettes and pipes and paraphernalia but it also houses lots of junk that is just bits and pieces of this and that. I go mad with this store- it’s sense of disorganization is frightening and yet I know that Margaret and Mary (who have worked here the longest) know exactly where everything is…
Margaret is the manager of the store, her sister Mary Rose owns it, but Margaret runs it. She is a small little lady that has a very open and loving heart. As I might have mentioned before, she had an accident or a birth defect that has caused facial lacerations. But it was so long ago; she doesn’t seem to allow it to hold her back. She is in her 50’s and is engaged to Robert. I think she is of Irish decent, but she also has a bit of an English accent. She lived in both England and even in America for a time-so she has a mixed accent. She lives with her mother.
Robert, who is English, but has lived in Ireland for about 35 years, lives on the family farm and raises cattle. I have no idea what that means, but I know it doesn’t include cows- which must be milked. He told me his father-raised cows and when he died Robert stopped doing it. He said it controlled your life, you have to milk at the same time 2x a day and it just doesn’t have enough in profit- so he fazed it out. He now just basically fattens up the cattle for slotter. He only needs to get feed to them every other day and it allows him to come up to Westport for a few days. He lives quite a distance from his girlfriend Margaret and this part time job. Robert has also recently completed a degree in Accounting and is looking to find work in that area. But I think he’s a bit afraid to get into the field. Working in the farming area and then trying to move to an office life is a big change…he doesn’t seem to be ready yet.
Ruth is a tall woman that is married and runs a B&B out by Crough Patrick, which is in her backyard. Her B&B is quite large – she has 15 beds. She is a nice woman, but loves to be involved in the gossip going around. She knows EVERYONE and everything about them.
I remember a saying that Maya Angelo said, and Oprah reiterates often. (I hope I get it right) She said that people tell you EXACTLY who they are, if would only listen…It’s a very true statement. And I had this very clearly shown to me by Ruth.
I had been working with Ruth for a few weeks and she would tell me things about people, like about their family life, children, drinking issues or womanizing – that kind of thing. Which is kind of telling stories to a deaf person- I don’t have any idea as to whom she is talking about, plus I don’t really care either. So she was a gossip and through her behavior that she could really hold a grudge.
Anyway, one day I had told her about a situation that I found myself in. I was offered a situation for free room and board for cleaning the house of a man. I told her his name and she quickly tensed up and said that he was not a nice man. She said that he “had woman” in his home before and they were more then tenants. Then she told me that his wife was in the home where Ruth once worked and on his wife’s deathbed he wouldn’t go to her and just stood in the doorway without a tear in his eye. “He is a cold man” and “once I heard that he drove right past his wife while she walked down the road with bags.” Well, I saw that she was holding a grudge against this man and (perpetuating it) on the basis that she felt that he was not ACTING like a man grieving the loss of his wife because he wasn’t showing his feelings-like she felt that he should. Then the added little story of the driving past his wife (like this would validate her more) – maybe he didn’t see her, maybe they were arguing and she wouldn’t let him pick her up OR maybe it was just made up! I have found that if there is nothing to talk about in Ireland – people just make assumptions and as Teresa say’s “they put leg’s on it”! I see this DAILY with both Ruth and her sidekick, Mary. So with this interaction with Ruth, she showed me her grudge holding abilities and her behavior of making up a story to justify her feelings. But I soon learned the lesson on St. Patrick’s Day all too clearly!
On St. Pat’s day, I was working with her and early in the day her daughter and son-in-law and 3 grandchildren came into the store. They live in Dublin and came down for the day. She ended out going to lunch with them. Later, she was leaving out to go on an errand and said, “If Susan comes in, tell her I’ll be back in a minute”. I wasn’t sure whom Susan was so I said, “You mean the tall drink of water?” But a customer came up and I didn’t hear if she said yes or no. I pretty much forgot all about the interaction.
Well, I came back to work the following week and was working with Ruth again. She was very cold to me and the energy in the store was very tense. I couldn’t imagine that I was the cause of the tension, so I figured something must have happened earlier in the day. I just kind of sat back to see if I could see what was up. Ruth was in the back of the store cleaning off some of the shelves and Margaret and Robert were in the back. I saw that Ruth was fine with them, but with me, she was not receptive. So finally I asked her if she was mad with me? And she said, “Yes!” I asked what I had done and she proceeded to tell me that she was quite upset with me, and that I had treated her and her daughter with such disrespect and I was so cruel. She said that she didn’t know why I would be so mean to her for she was nothing but kind to me! She has been so upset about it she hasn’t been able to eat for days over the upset! I was standing there pretty much like the time with Noeline- like I was kicked in the groin! I asked her what did I do that showed such disrespect and cruelness? She said that I called her daughter a “tall drink of water!” She said that she feels that her daughter is a beautiful woman and she is not ugly! I was like “What?! I never said she wasn’t!” But she said that that’s what I called her!
I explained that I meant no disrespect to her or her daughter! It was just a saying about someone that is tall and with me being so short, I notice TALL people! It was in no way a reference to her beauty or anything derogatory! She said in HER country, it has a different meaning and she was so upset with me! I tired to apologize and she just blew me off. I started to get upset, but got a hold of myself and knew that I meant nothing bad about the statement and I did all that I could do to rectify the situation.
Well, for the next two weeks it was like working in Alaska, no interaction or conversation. She was not even looking at me! I decided that she refused to allow me “foreigner stupidity” and take it for what I said it was- an error in terminology. And give me the benefit of the doubt. But she was unable to do that and the freeze-out continued.
But I learned something in this situation. Not only the obvious lesson of watching myself in using terms that MIGHT be received in error. But the real lesson is that I did not accept total blame for the situation. My old self would beat myself up relentlessly for the error and I would bend over backwards to kiss this woman’s ass for my error. I would make myself miserable and anything she would do and say to me would be magnified into self-hatred and self-abuse. I DID NOT DO THIS…I took responsibility of my error in using the term, from her perspective and I apologized. And it was her choice to hold on to it and make HER LIFE miserable-and that was HER choice.
See Maya Angelo is right, had I listened- I would have realized that Ruth would make up her own story as to what I meant, rather then ask me what I meant by the comment (because I was from a different culture). And she would hold a grudge. Which is who she is. But I now listened and saw it played out, and I learned from it. That’s all we can really ask for, isn’t it?
But after about 2 weeks of a freeze out (only 4-5 days working together) I was telling Mary some new situations that I found myself in, and Ruth being the gossip Queen that she is, could not help herself but to interject into our conversation. Another thing about Ruth, she doesn’t like being left out from the group “in the know” about ANYTHING going on in the town. So the thaw began and soon we were back to “normal”.
Mary is a small petite woman that is in my age range (late 40’s to middle 50’s) she lives in her family home with her brother. She has never been married, but was engaged for a time. She said that it just fizzled out. She has been working at the newsagent for about 12 years. She is also a lovely woman but also likes to partake in the local gossip with Ruth. She has a quirky way of repeating herself. For example, we had a few “little brats” come into the shop on a Saturday and they put off a stink bomb and Mary went insane! It was pretty funny because it was like the gas my stepfather would give off when we were kids- it was quiet, slow and DEADLY! I was helping a customer at the counter and was engrossed in trying to pack up a purchase and it just kind of swept past our noses and it was horrible! We both looked at each other and I said “Whew!” Then Mary shrieked out “it was a stick bomb!” And the customers kind of filed out of the store. Mary sprayed and sprayed it and just my step-dad’s- it just kind of hung in the air…for hours!
Well, for the next week Mary would tell the “Stink Story” to whom ever she could, she would say “a bunch of brats of four or five came in on Saturday and they we so disrespectful and put off a stink bomb” then she would look at me, then like she was a skipped record she said “a Bunch of Brats of four or five came in on Saturday and they we so disrespectful and put off a stick bomb” and she would look a me again- in exactly the same way! At first I thought I had a brain fart or something- but I find that she does this repeating thing often, it’s just one of her quirks.
Rosemary is the owner of this little hodge-podge of a store. Her 1st husband inherited the store when they were first married. From what I heard, her husband was a bit of a drinker and ended up dying early on. She was left with a couple of children and the store. EVERYONE comments on Rosemary’s beauty. She is a very sharp woman in her 50’s, so I’m sure she was stunning in her youth. She is a demure woman that talks low and has a great smile. She hasn’t worked in the store for quite a few years (behind the counter) so she is very unsure of how to do things. When I first started the job, we worked together for about 1 hour and she knew less then me! It made me see all the stuff that I had picked up.
Rosemary has re-married. A boy that she dated BEFORE her husband came back into her life years after he moved to Dublin and became a very affluent solicitor (lawyer). He came back and they married and they now live outside of Westport in Old Head Area and a second home in Dublin. She in a grandmother by her son in America and her youngest is in college.
So, that’s the lay of the land- Next, I’ll tell you about the JOB!
Tags: Ireland, Travel, work
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