pantoum's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WHAT�S IN IT FOR ME? 309. This morning, we held a reception for an employee who is retiring next week. The dean and a faculty member who worked closely with her talked about her �quiet contribution� (at the whopping rate of $26,000 annually after thirty years of �quiet� service), her diligence, and attention to detail. Then they presented her with a certificate and nice gift, and then we all enjoyed brunch together.I�m glad we honored her publicly, glad her family heard her colleagues talk about how valuable she has been to our organization. I couldn�t help but remember, though, that, right after I was hired, I was told to get rid of this woman who had worked at the organization for twenty-seven years as well as another long-term employee because our budget was tight. So yeah, I�m glad she gets to depart with good feelings about her colleagues and the hand-shaking dean and all that, but I also know she�s leaving with no idea of how hard I had to work to save her position just three years before she was eligible to retire. The other employee whose job I saved (by being either arrogant or naive enough to say "instead of telling me whom to lay off, why don't you assume that I know how to do my job and tell me how much money you need?") has taken to saying, when someone hands her work that she does not want to do, �What�s in it for me?� (Um, your job?) This annoys me no end, but I nevertheless believe that it is time for me to cultivate her attitude. I want to learn how to move through the world according to the principles of �What�s in it for me?� and �What have you done for me lately?,� to quit opening myself up for more pain and disappointment. Have been thinking about commitments and love and vulnerability and intimacy and the value of words in general and stupid stupid faith a lot this past month�hell, this past year and a half�and just feel jaded. Depleted. I have never understood how people can toss around a word as loaded as love like it�s just some monosyllabic regurgitation that emphasizes the right syllable at the right moment in the right sentence or sounds good coming out of your mouth after sex. And I�m tired of believing in that word, tired of sharing that word and my poetry and my heart with people who just toss it around. So I have been asking myself if it's worth it to experience deep intimacy with someone. And is it? I mean, what's the point if you just get hurt in the end? Then I tell myself that Pottergrrl and I just fucked each other anyway and that�s obviously all it meant in the end to either of us. Sometimes I wonder if it would have been less emotionally difficult to have picked up someone and fucked her instead and then put my eaerbuds back on and told her she could go home now.... That�s how I wish I could be right now. I wish I could just tune out the whole fucking world and quit giving a shit and just smash any last little thread of belief I have in words or people or faith to smithereens. I just want my heart to be left the fuck alone. Is that too much to ask? 3:59 p.m. - 2006-03-22 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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