Loners

Two instances stand out clearly in my mind, the first occurred when I was 9 or 10 years old. I went to a school that made an effort to expose their students to the arts and one night they took us to a play at the Omaha Playhouse.

As we were leaving the theater a middle aged man on crutches stepped out of the crowd, grabbed my arm and asked me where I went to school. Not knowing what else to do I told him “Western Hills Elementary”. The guy leaned in close and looked me right in the eye and said “I didn’t know they let pigs go to Western Hills.” And shoved me away. To this day I have no idea what brought this on or why the guy picked me but it impacted me to the point that I remember it clearly 37 years later.

The second instance occurred while working for my current employer. Sorry but it’s kinda long.

I am a security guard ,that alone is enough to make me not want to deal with people but this particular instance I received an email from our scheduler directing me to report to a certain site to work 1130p to 0730a.

I showed up at 1120, walked in and met the guy I was relieving and the guy I was working with. Neither one had much to say and the guy I was relieving left. So, I do the beginning of the shift stuff w/ the other guy and went out to make my first rounds; mind you, not a word from either one that anything is out of the ordinary.

About 20 minutes into my rounds I get a call from the supervisor asking why I was late to work. I told him I had no idea what he was talking about, that my shift started at 1130 and I had arrived at 1120 and he informed me that the shift time was 1100P to 0700A. I go back to the office and show the supervisor the email from the scheduler specifying 1130 and he tells me he may still have to write me up. My “partner” witnesses the entire interaction saying nothing. After the supervisor leaves I make a point of apologizing to the “partner” and finish the shift.

The next night I show up 25 minutes early, to apologize to the guy I relieved and to give him the option of leaving early if he chooses to. I even made a point of telling him that I would have been highly offended if I were in his position especially if they guy that came in late didn’t even bother to apologize for it and that I want to make it clear to him that I hadn’t known I was late and that it hadn’t been my intent to inconvenience him.

The guy looked my right in the eye, told me all was forgiven, it was a simple mistake, coulda happened to anyone, water under the bridge and let’s not worry about it. He then spent the next 18 months holding a grudge over the incident and trying to torpedo me every chance he got. At one point he even wrote a 10 paragraph essay to the site supervisor to complain that I wasn’t a team player because I hadn’t swept the office the night before.

Working as a security guard I can assure you that I could relate dozens of other instances of people treating me like shit but those two stand out as watershed moments in my life.
I have no idea what happened to the first guy but the second guy was later terminated for wrecking a company vehicle. He did stick around long enough to see me get promoted to supervisor though.

I now work on a site where I am the only person there 90% of the time. I can go weeks on end without seeing another person at work except the guy I relieve and the guy that relieves me. After a year out here I’m not sure I could handle a job where I actually had to work w/ other people