Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Complicated compliments

When I was in my pre-teen to my early twenties, I would sometimes give compliments that were phrased weirdly and were taken as insults; and I had no idea how to explain myself out of the hole that I had somehow gotten myself in.  Sometimes all I would have to do was gush about how I loved the colour of something, and would say something like "I love scarlet," when the colour I was talking about was really cherry (or some other colour that was one or two shades lighter or darker than scarlet) and someone within earshot would light into me, telling me how stupid I was for thinking that colour was scarlet when it was really this other colour.....and this person would leave, thinking that I was an idiot for not knowing the difference between cherry and scarlet.
What I just described has never actually happened.  But there have been many times when things that I have said were taken, not just out of context, but to another planet.  Now, after getting myself into a few painful social situations that have left some scars, I did eventually learn how to Watch. My. Words.  This does mean that I don't give nearly as many compliments as I used to, and I definitely don't gush the way I used to, at least not as often.  And when I do give compliments, it's always "Nice dress/coat/tie/whatever."  Which is to the benefit of the person I'm complimenting.  And when I was a teenager, I gushed too much anyways.

Thursday, September 5, 2013

Empathy and lies

I've been thinking a lot lately about the assumption that people on the autistic spectrum don't really have a sense of empathy.  It's a lie, or maybe a better word for it, is falsehood.  Whatever you call it, it's not true and this idea of how autistic people think probably won't die in my lifetime and that of lots of people younger than me.  What many non-autistic people see, (and if they don't they don't they need to take a closer look) is that many people on the spectrum, some children, some adults, have an undeveloped sense of empathy, which is different from not even having one.  I have a sense of empathy, although I do have to admit that it didn't develop at all until I was in my early teens.  But it only extended to our family pets, for a long time.  I didn't feel empathy ( which I'm pretty sure means being able to put myself in somebody else's shoes) for actual human beings until I was in my mid to late twenties.  So there you go.  Empathy actually does live on the spectrum....but you might have to be autistic to actually be able to see it.

Friday, August 30, 2013

Anxiety vs. Anger vs. Rage

I've been musing lately about the differences between anxiety, anger and rage.  To my way of thinking, it isn't much.  Anxiety is fear; anger, for many people, is the same as anxiety, but it has an edge; with rage it's the same, but an even bigger edge.  So anger is anxiety with a knife.  Rage is anxiety with an AK-47.

Sunday, July 21, 2013

Posting this probably means I'm a jerk

but I'm going to do it anyway.  I have a low tolerance for people who will rant and rave about others doing stuff that they think is wrong, even going so far to not only hurt other people's feelings, but run right over them; and then, when they think no one is looking, will indulge in the very thing that they preach against.  What started me thinking on this, is the family reunion that happened over the past week and a half.  As the family functions started to happen, it became very clear that a female relative of mine does not like that so many of us drink soda pop, such as coke, root beer, sprite etc. In fact, we all knew about her objections against junk food and pop.  What's hard to take, very hard to take, is that she seems to think that if she screams loud enough and often enough, we will come to see things that same way that she does.  She also seems to think that it is her God given right to "let" us do things.  Yes, her family, many of who are full grown adults who can walk and talk, and dress ourselves and even (gasp!) make other decisions without consulting her. But that's another post.  Remember when I said about indulging when nobody's looking?  She seems to think that it's okay to take a sip from somebody else's drink (particularly mine) when she thinks that no one will notice.  I guess it's easier for her to be rude than wasteful.  I guess that it's petty and immature of me to even care so much.  But after all the BS she's put me through because I drink pop and she doesn't, well, it's difficult to take.

Thursday, March 7, 2013

Why I should never work nights

The last job I had, I was a night janitor, or maybe what I really was, was a custodial crew member? 
I worked at the local university, just 2 blocks from where I live.  Being able to walk to work was very attractive to me, as did working at the same university that I want to start going to this September(totally would not have qualified for free tuition, since I technically didn't work for the university).  I asked for part time hours, for some reason that I'm not aware of, I got full time.  At the end of the interview, the supervisor told me to fill out a form and bring it back on a specific day.  When I did, I found out that they expected me to work that same night.  I had no idea before that, since no one had told me.  In hindsight, maybe I should have asked in the interview, but how hard would it have been for the supervisor to have told me?  Especially since I hadn't gotten any sleep that day?  Because of this, I kept falling asleep standing up, something my poor trainer noticed, and found very annoying.  Eventually, I got the hang of sleeping during the day and working at night....sort of.  Working nights is hard; there are many good reasons why so many people can keep it up for only so long.
Every shift started with a meeting, where we would all sit in the cafeteria and listen to our supervisor and his assistant, talk to us about what was going on.  Most of the time, it was how this guy who worked for the university inspected our zones (certain buildings that we were supposed to clean. My team had five different buildings, one of which had five floors, and an elevator that broke down twice while I worked there. First time it was out for a week), or in other words, went around with a white glove and magnifying glass, looked for dust and if he found any dust, showed the supervisor and gave him hell. That must be why just about every shift that I worked there (from the first week of October, right after the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend, to the week before Christmas) started with what I think was meant to be an inspirational speech from our supervisor, but what everybody mistook for a guilt trip, because that's exactly what it sounded and felt like. Those speeches could be part of the reason why I felt like crying just about every shift, they could also be the reason why somebody quit or was fired about every other week. I know for sure that they're the reason why we were behind schedule almost every night of the week. They put us a good 10-30 minutes behind schedule, making all of us hate our supervisors a little bit more each night. The only good thing about them was the jokes that would get made by a few of the bolder people there (and of course were given dirty looks or were reprimanded). I hope this post made sense. It's late, and I'm tired. Should be in bed by now, but I really, really wanted to get this post done.