So! An announcement that gives me a little burble of hope!
I have completed all the qualifications for getting my Standard Texas Teacher's Certificate. One the state processes them (which I'm told takes just a few days to a week or so), I will be a fully certified teacher, eligible to teach EC (pre-k) to 8th grade!
Next step?
A job...
Sunday, April 26, 2015
Misinterpretations....
The internet tends to misconstrue everything someone says. That much is a fact as we cannot convey a tone through the use of text and emojis. Everything is taken at face value, or on previous experience, or our own misinterpretation of the things the people we talk to say.
I seem to find myself on the ends of quite a few of these over the past months, and it's having a major drain on my already diminished emotional capacity. The latest began this morning.
Few of you readers (since i know of only person who occasionally stops by my blog, its safe to say that this is everyone), on the weekends, I work overnight at a hotel. Now, this is particularly rough because on the weekdays I work mornings only. Schools don't have the option of coming in later, sadly. Friday morning I get up at five (this week after about 4 hours of sleep alone), go to work, run errands, attempt to take a nap (I managed an hour this week, yay) and then go to my other job at the hotel where I work from 11pm to 7am. Course, they had me training someone, which wears me out already, the phone was ringing off the hook because of an event here in town, and my relief in the morning was late. So, suffice to say, I was exhausted, but wouldn't you know it? This Saturday, I had a surge of insomnia, and barely slept three hours through the entire day, and repeated basically the same night. Sunday morning, this morning, I was dead on my feet.
A friend and I started conversing... sorta. And I guess I wasn't as responsive as I normally am. Well... she took my slow, short replies as something different. After a thumbs up emoji went through, a while later she wrote back with an implied "fuck you" and an "I'm not going to deal with you when you are like this."
30 minutes later, I jerk out of my dozed off sleep and get the message. Needless to say I was hurt. Because there was no 'cold shoulder' that I was giving off. And looking back at the messages, I could only assume that my responses weren't what she wanted that morning, or the length of time between my posts wasn't quick enough. I don't know.
Hours later, she comes back, claws still bared (though, this was my interpretation of the situation now, she says). I had had an attitude, apparently, that wreaked of hostility and I needed to chill. I was floored. Nothing I had said there was hostile in the slightest.
I explained. Told her how little sleep I had had, and pointed out that nothing I said was hostile. It was, yet again, her misinterpretation of the situation. Her reading something into my words at simply wasn't there. And the only explanation I got? "Oh, it seemed like it."
Over the course of the conversation, I got told to "chill", to "drop it", to "calm down", to "get over it or don't" but she didn't want to talk about it. I got told I was "hostile enough that she has to be worried bout it all the time." I was told I was being hysterical. Overreacting. No apology, and basically waving off my hurt feelings about it, until after the whole thing was said and done, and even then it was accompanied with an "I don't care."
Was I overreacting? By typing out my side, by trying to explain what had happened and why her interpretation of the situation was wrong? Maybe so. But this wasn't the first time this same friend had overreacted, misinterpreted something I wrote, and proceeded to jump all over me for it. It's not a good feeling, especially not after the week I had. I felt like garbage, and made to feel guilty for something that I didn't do.
Now, I will not say I am innocent in this. That I never misinterpret and overreact. I know there have been times when she has said something as well, and I had taken it in a different way than intended. I have reacted in kind. So the guilt is on both parties, not just one.
But the reason why I'm writing this today is this: you cannot gauge someone's tone, someone's meaning by the written word alone. No matter what your experience chatting with the person is, how well you know them, or anything of the sort. Their word choice might simply had been poor. They might going through something (or hell! YOU might be!) and things came out different than they say. They might be joking around, being sarcastic. Point is, there's no telling. Not exactly. Give someone the benefit of the doubt because honestly? They probably didn't mean it the way it sounded. Or, rather, the way you think it sounded.
I am glad this friend and I ended up making up, calling a truce, and hopefully learning from this this time. Because honestly? Internet misinterpretations should not be the cause to ruin an otherwise wonderful friendship.
I seem to find myself on the ends of quite a few of these over the past months, and it's having a major drain on my already diminished emotional capacity. The latest began this morning.
Few of you readers (since i know of only person who occasionally stops by my blog, its safe to say that this is everyone), on the weekends, I work overnight at a hotel. Now, this is particularly rough because on the weekdays I work mornings only. Schools don't have the option of coming in later, sadly. Friday morning I get up at five (this week after about 4 hours of sleep alone), go to work, run errands, attempt to take a nap (I managed an hour this week, yay) and then go to my other job at the hotel where I work from 11pm to 7am. Course, they had me training someone, which wears me out already, the phone was ringing off the hook because of an event here in town, and my relief in the morning was late. So, suffice to say, I was exhausted, but wouldn't you know it? This Saturday, I had a surge of insomnia, and barely slept three hours through the entire day, and repeated basically the same night. Sunday morning, this morning, I was dead on my feet.
A friend and I started conversing... sorta. And I guess I wasn't as responsive as I normally am. Well... she took my slow, short replies as something different. After a thumbs up emoji went through, a while later she wrote back with an implied "fuck you" and an "I'm not going to deal with you when you are like this."
30 minutes later, I jerk out of my dozed off sleep and get the message. Needless to say I was hurt. Because there was no 'cold shoulder' that I was giving off. And looking back at the messages, I could only assume that my responses weren't what she wanted that morning, or the length of time between my posts wasn't quick enough. I don't know.
Hours later, she comes back, claws still bared (though, this was my interpretation of the situation now, she says). I had had an attitude, apparently, that wreaked of hostility and I needed to chill. I was floored. Nothing I had said there was hostile in the slightest.
I explained. Told her how little sleep I had had, and pointed out that nothing I said was hostile. It was, yet again, her misinterpretation of the situation. Her reading something into my words at simply wasn't there. And the only explanation I got? "Oh, it seemed like it."
Over the course of the conversation, I got told to "chill", to "drop it", to "calm down", to "get over it or don't" but she didn't want to talk about it. I got told I was "hostile enough that she has to be worried bout it all the time." I was told I was being hysterical. Overreacting. No apology, and basically waving off my hurt feelings about it, until after the whole thing was said and done, and even then it was accompanied with an "I don't care."
Was I overreacting? By typing out my side, by trying to explain what had happened and why her interpretation of the situation was wrong? Maybe so. But this wasn't the first time this same friend had overreacted, misinterpreted something I wrote, and proceeded to jump all over me for it. It's not a good feeling, especially not after the week I had. I felt like garbage, and made to feel guilty for something that I didn't do.
Now, I will not say I am innocent in this. That I never misinterpret and overreact. I know there have been times when she has said something as well, and I had taken it in a different way than intended. I have reacted in kind. So the guilt is on both parties, not just one.
But the reason why I'm writing this today is this: you cannot gauge someone's tone, someone's meaning by the written word alone. No matter what your experience chatting with the person is, how well you know them, or anything of the sort. Their word choice might simply had been poor. They might going through something (or hell! YOU might be!) and things came out different than they say. They might be joking around, being sarcastic. Point is, there's no telling. Not exactly. Give someone the benefit of the doubt because honestly? They probably didn't mean it the way it sounded. Or, rather, the way you think it sounded.
I am glad this friend and I ended up making up, calling a truce, and hopefully learning from this this time. Because honestly? Internet misinterpretations should not be the cause to ruin an otherwise wonderful friendship.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)