"First Words of the Day Are Hard, Huh?"
There are rules. There's no crying in baseball. Say please and thank you. Don't drop doors on people behind you. No letting your toes hang over the sides of your shoes (that one's for you, J!). No elbows on the table. Return things you've borrowed. No talking in the mornings. What's that? That's not a rule? Well it should be. It is in my world.
Despite the fact that I usually wake up between 4 and 8 a.m., I still consider myself to not be a morning person. Why? Because I can't really speak to people for about an hour to an hour and a half after I wake up. I can walk around, go shopping, run errands, all that. But actually speaking out loud? Not so much.
I don't know why exactly it is, but I'm just not ready to be interacting with people in the early mornings. My brain is racing, but speaking is out of the question. This is why I try to not speak in the mornings. This is why if you call me early in the morning and ask if you woke me up, if you did, I WILL say yes. This is why I try to get up for work at 7:30, so that by the time I'm strolling down Grandma Lane, I'm ready to be bright and chipper. This is why, if I do go out about the town in the mornings, I discourage people from talking to me by avoiding making eye contact. My system works pretty well. Most of the time.
My across-the-hall neighbor is crazy. When I first moved in here, my brother helped, and I think she thought he was moving in also. So when my actual (female) roommate moved in, Crazy Neighbor was confused. My roommate told me she got a dirty look from CN. The first time CN talked to me, she asked what I did. I answered, and asked what she did. Yoga teacher and tarot card reader. I resisted the urge to say, "Wow, how very hippy-dippy of you."
CN is haughty. I don't know what exactly makes her think she has the right to be haughty, but she actually DOES tilt her chin up so that she can look down her nose at people. When she asks people to hold the elevator for her, she never rushes like most people do. She continues with her casual stroll and regal smile, as if riding in the elevator with her will be a huge thrill for all who have the golden opportunity.
When CN and I are the only ones in the elevator, even if I'm standing closer to the opening, she will push past me so she can get out of the elevator first. Once I was talking with the property manager and somehow the subject of people getting locked out came up. She told me that CN locked herself out so many times ($50 for Security to come unlock your door for you) that now she almost always leaves her door unlocked.
I think CN is one of those people who feels better about herself when she has made other people feel badly about themselves. It's for this reason that I refuse to engage with her at all. I do a lot of smiling vaguely and murmuring pleasantries and pretending I didn't hear her when we run into each other.
Yesterday morning I was standing at the elevator waiting to leave my apartment to go to work. The elevator opened and CN was coming back up to our floor. I stepped back to let her walk by, and she stepped into my dance space (this is my dance space. this is your dance space. I don't go into yours, you don't go into mine). I stepped to the side, in the direction AWAY from where she would go to get to her apartment. She stepped with me. It was morning, I do not interact well with people in the morning. I still assumed it was a mistake, and again, stepped away. Again, she stepped in the direction I'd just gone in. I glared at her, and stopped moving so she could just move around me. CN seemed to think this was funny. To me, pretty much nothing that involves interacting with people is funny in the morning.
She stepped even closer towards me, and I snapped. I put my hands up, palms out and mumbled something - I think it was "Okay!" and again, took a step away from her. She got the message because she walked away. So glad I'm moving in a few months.
Despite the fact that I usually wake up between 4 and 8 a.m., I still consider myself to not be a morning person. Why? Because I can't really speak to people for about an hour to an hour and a half after I wake up. I can walk around, go shopping, run errands, all that. But actually speaking out loud? Not so much.
I don't know why exactly it is, but I'm just not ready to be interacting with people in the early mornings. My brain is racing, but speaking is out of the question. This is why I try to not speak in the mornings. This is why if you call me early in the morning and ask if you woke me up, if you did, I WILL say yes. This is why I try to get up for work at 7:30, so that by the time I'm strolling down Grandma Lane, I'm ready to be bright and chipper. This is why, if I do go out about the town in the mornings, I discourage people from talking to me by avoiding making eye contact. My system works pretty well. Most of the time.
My across-the-hall neighbor is crazy. When I first moved in here, my brother helped, and I think she thought he was moving in also. So when my actual (female) roommate moved in, Crazy Neighbor was confused. My roommate told me she got a dirty look from CN. The first time CN talked to me, she asked what I did. I answered, and asked what she did. Yoga teacher and tarot card reader. I resisted the urge to say, "Wow, how very hippy-dippy of you."
CN is haughty. I don't know what exactly makes her think she has the right to be haughty, but she actually DOES tilt her chin up so that she can look down her nose at people. When she asks people to hold the elevator for her, she never rushes like most people do. She continues with her casual stroll and regal smile, as if riding in the elevator with her will be a huge thrill for all who have the golden opportunity.
When CN and I are the only ones in the elevator, even if I'm standing closer to the opening, she will push past me so she can get out of the elevator first. Once I was talking with the property manager and somehow the subject of people getting locked out came up. She told me that CN locked herself out so many times ($50 for Security to come unlock your door for you) that now she almost always leaves her door unlocked.
I think CN is one of those people who feels better about herself when she has made other people feel badly about themselves. It's for this reason that I refuse to engage with her at all. I do a lot of smiling vaguely and murmuring pleasantries and pretending I didn't hear her when we run into each other.
Yesterday morning I was standing at the elevator waiting to leave my apartment to go to work. The elevator opened and CN was coming back up to our floor. I stepped back to let her walk by, and she stepped into my dance space (this is my dance space. this is your dance space. I don't go into yours, you don't go into mine). I stepped to the side, in the direction AWAY from where she would go to get to her apartment. She stepped with me. It was morning, I do not interact well with people in the morning. I still assumed it was a mistake, and again, stepped away. Again, she stepped in the direction I'd just gone in. I glared at her, and stopped moving so she could just move around me. CN seemed to think this was funny. To me, pretty much nothing that involves interacting with people is funny in the morning.
She stepped even closer towards me, and I snapped. I put my hands up, palms out and mumbled something - I think it was "Okay!" and again, took a step away from her. She got the message because she walked away. So glad I'm moving in a few months.
posted by Green at 6/10/2006 11:11:00 AM
5 Comments:
Wait - you're moving? Is Steamroller going with you? How did I not know this?
Ugh. Not a morning person myself. Which is going to be a problem when I have to show up for 7:00 a.m. clinicals here shortly. Like you, I plan to wake up early to give myself time to find my happy place. And drink enough coffee.
I can't stand haughty people. It makes me want to trip them.
I love "dance space"
I call it "personal space bubble"
People in England do not know it exsists!
i can only take so much of people like that. after a while, i'd have a hard time keeping my mouth shut. especially the "hold the elevator" crap. i'd probably say, "you better hurry your ass up."
what can i say about mornings? i didn't even know they existed until i gave birth.
i think she drawn to you like a magnet.
Oh and you SO do not want me to spend the night at your house. I am such a yapper in the morning and afternoon and night. Really, I am a morning person. All is possible in the morning. I havent blown the day yet.
and thanks for the sandal toe bit.
Another "me, too!" moment....
I know that if I talk to peppy people in the morning, I'll be snippy, so I just keep my mouth shut and try to do the vague smile thing. Some people just don't get it though. A couple of them (these would be the same ones who make it onto my no-socializing list because they are proven backstabbers) have called me stuck-up, rude, and unprofessional for not calling out a cheery "Good morning!" to every person in the office at 8am. I've been tempted to track down these people in the afternoon when I'm feeling energetic and they're dragging and start a happy chatter just to see them give me the death look that I manage to not give them in the morning.
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