Haters Gonna Hate
I knew this day would come, it is official. The woman I thought of as a friend at work is jealous to the point that she has begun to distance herself from me. It was inevitable. All interpersonal relationships with women of my acquaintance eventually end.
Today at work, I realized that every time I tried to engage Jem in conversation, she would, after a time, find a way to disengage, either by becoming distracted with something work related, or bringing others into the conversation so as to depersonalize the situation.
I thought it was a fluke, that we were just really busy. Then I thought that maybe our schedules were just at odds and that is why it was like I had not seen her in forever. But I realize now that is not the case. Our schedules have not been at odds. She has been there most of the days that I have been working, and she has been hiding out away from the area of her responsibility which just happens to overlap the space where our desks are situated.
Conclusion: Jem is actively avoiding me. I would not make this assumption if I didn’t know that her default setting is to give “people she doesn’t like the silent treatment”. When the soup sandwich returned to work after his false self-quarantine period, she refused to speak to him.
Riding the envy coaster…
She is not speaking to me now. She only calls me at my desk if she has something specifically work related that I have to handle. She also is short and borderline rude to me on the phone. She stopped inviting me to have lunch together, and she is hiding out in a different part of the building most of the day if we are at work on the same day. I asked her if she was avoiding me, but she denied, denied, denied. Oh well.
I would be more upset about it if I wasn’t so busy. I am busy managing this high profile project which I believe is at the root of the reason why she isn’t speaking to me: jealousy/envy. As I said before, I ain’t sorry.
Jem has had plenty of opportunities to make a name for herself. If she feels like she is being held back, there is no one holding her back, except herself. When I started working at this company, I basically taught myself how to do things because no one seemed to have the time to show me what to do. Lucky for them I’m a quick study.
For several months, I would ask Jem why she didn’t know how to use the main software. She gave me several excuses, mostly that she just didn’t have the time. I get it. Sometimes it’s not a priority. But here is the thing, it was on her development plan, and she kept putting it off anyway. She’s really good at making up excuses when she hasn’t taken initiative to do something. They even sent her to Florida to attend a special training class just for this software!
Did I need to attend it? No. I could have, had I not surpassed what they would have taught me in the training seminar by that point. They knew sending me was going to be pointless because I already knew the software. Sadly, she went to the seminar, and came back knowing all of one new thing, but was no more proficient than anyone else. What a wasted opportunity.
Sometimes better late than never is not good enough.
Jem’s sudden initiative after the furlough comes a little too late.
She has decided to start learning the skills she should have learned a year ago. In the past year that she should have been figuring these things out, I learned those things on my own, established myself as a quick-learner and a leader. I learned all the things she should have known, and now I know how to do them better.
Let me rewind to yesterday. The new addition to the team, I’m gonna refer to her as VitaminD, has been with the company with an ungodly number of years. In any case, when the company was reopening from the furlough, they were calling people in, starting with the most essential personnel.
VitaminD, in her own roundabout way brought up the fact that when they were deciding on the order of people to bring back to work, she understood why they picked me over her.
Yes. She legit told me that to my face. She tried to save face explaining that I brought an “outside perspective” and that justified them asking me to return first. Ha! I don’t think so.
It was the fact that I was more qualified than VitaminD, and had more usable skills, that justified my return to work a full month before they brought her back. There are reasons she doesn’t want to admit that explain why she didn’t get picked. If you spend all that time with a company and aren’t considered essential, perhaps it’s time to consider doing something else.
She can go piss up a rope. I saw VitaminD today following the new Department Head around. B, who clearly has difficulty doing her actual job, was following this DH around hoping to bask in her reflected glory. It was quite sad to behold.
The icing on the cake that came direct from the oven of shame set to gas-mark egg on your face, was the look on VitaminD’s face when the DH asked me if I thought it would be a good idea that she schedule a meeting with me next week to bring all the players up to speed about this upgrade.
Of course I think that is a good idea. But VitaminD practically died because she wasn’t one of the players for this meeting, and status is everything for her. She takes every opportunity to remind everyone how long she has been with the company.
Which begs the question, why then, is she not in a better position? Surely she could have climbed the ladder by now? Or perhaps, she has tried, and failed…
Status is a big deal for VitaminD. And my friend Jem hates VitaminD. They are both, by all appearances, super jealous of me and want what I have. Maybe they should start being friends since they have so much in common in hating on me.
This is not my first rodeo. I’ve ridden this carnival ride of envy before. Come at me bitches. I’m ready for you.
