Mostly Autobiographical

by Rob Gunther

  I thought it would be the same with the picnic, but it wasn’t. I had it at a public park, so I guess people got it into their heads that they didn’t have to listen to me anymore. But I was still the host, right? I’d be like, “Andre, didn’t I ask that all of the picnic blankets be laid out vertically?” and Andre was just like, “Well, yeah, but I wanted to lay out my blanket horizontally.” And then he just kind of shrugged at me and put his hands up halfway in the air like, what are you going to do?

  So I got in Andre’s face and reminded him that I was the host. I started to move his blanket myself, but he just picked it up and stormed off. Fine, I didn’t want him at my picnic anyway. That guy’s a total loser. Fucking Andre. I shouldn’t even have invited him in the first place. I sent out all of the invitations on Facebook, and this guy had the nerve to respond with a “maybe.” Maybe? Maybe I should have rescinded his invitation right then and there. But I didn’t, because I’m a nice guy. And then he just showed up anyway, without even bothering to change his RSVP to “Attending.”

  After he left, I checked the picnic’s Facebook event page. This time Andre changed it to “Not Attending.” What a big man, rubbing it in my face. I defriended him later in the day.

  Then some other people took out this badminton set and started putting it up. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” I told them as I confiscated the rackets. “Activities aren’t until later, and we’re not playing badminton, we’re playing kickball.”

  They were getting upset. I was getting upset. Actually, I wasn’t getting upset. I already was upset. I must have still been upset from that little tussle I had with Andre. They argued. I kept talking over everybody. Somebody tried to chase after me, to take back the rackets, but I’m the fastest runner out of all of my friends, so it was pointless. I’d let them get kind of close, let them think that they were about to catch me, but then I’d take off, really getting ahead of them. I kept this up for a few minutes, but in the end I just threw the rackets in a giant fountain in the middle of the park.

  So they started undoing the badminton set. I thought I’d won, but they were being such babies that they packed up and left.

  Good. I don’t know why I ever invited those jerks in the first place. That’s all you’re going to contribute to the picnic? A stupid baby tennis set? Take a hike. I told everyone else to get to work setting up the grill. They asked me where I had put the charcoal. I told them I didn’t bring any charcoal, that was Denise’s job. Denise claimed she didn’t know she was supposed to bring any. It was right on the Facebook page, a link to the web site I had set up for the picnic. There was an Excel spreadsheet you were supposed to download to find out what you were in charge of bringing.

  It turns out nobody downloaded it. Nobody brought anything on the list. People just came with whatever they wanted. I was so pissed. I made an announcement, that everyone was uninvited from the picnic. “Actually,” I yelled, “you’re not even uninvited. You were never invited in the first place. Invitation annulled. And you know what else? Picnic’s cancelled. Go home. Thanks a lot everybody. Thanks for nothing.”

  Then my phone buzzed. It was an email. The email was from Facebook. It was a notification about a picnic, organized by Andre. I clicked on the link:

  “Hey everyone! Let’s have a picnic! Right now! Right over here, to your left! Bring whatever you want!”

  I turned my head. Andre was standing on the other side of the park, waving everybody over. Fucking Andre. That guy is such a poser. Always stealing my great ideas. I opened up the Facebook app and went to the picnic page and clicked on my RSVP: “Not Attending.”

  As I packed up my stuff and headed out to leave, I looked up to find everyone walking to Andre’s picnic, those traitors, those fair-weather friends. Someone else took off their shoes and waded into the fountain to get the badminton rackets. Someone else was setting up the net.

  I thought about calling up the cops and telling them a group of people was loitering in the park, drinking alcohol out of concealed containers. And was that marijuana smoke I was smelling? But I decided against it. I’d be the bigger person here.

  But by the time I got home, I was so pissed all over again that I actually did call the cops. And I told them a group of extremists was planning a terrorist attack in the park. Then I went on Facebook and wrote a status update: “Anybody else hear about terrorists in the park?”

  Stop telling me that I’m talking too fast

  Sometimes people try to tell me that I’m talking too fast, so I’ll tell them back, even faster, I’m not talking too fast, they’re listening too slow, and I’ll have said it so fast that they’ll say, “What? See what I mean?” and I’ll respond back, “See? Exactly what I’m talking about.” Eventually, any further efforts at communication will break down. I don’t think I talk too fast. I can’t stand it when people talk too slow.

  Introductions are the worst. I get that you’re supposed to be pleasant and polite and everything, but to me, it’s totally selfish to monopolize someone else’s time, to start off a conversation with, “Well good afternoon! It’s so great to see you. How have you been?” all long and drawn out, the word afternoon extended pointlessly and annoyingly by an extra three syllables (af-tah-her-noo-oo-oon). It’s selfish because whoever is doing the talking is stopping whoever is listening dead in their tracks and saying to them, “All right, this is my time now. You’re going to listen to me. And I talk slow, a ton of extra words that won’t do anything for the discussion.”

  I could get the same message across in about one second with a succinct, “Hey,” or, “Hello,” if it’s somebody important, like the President. It’s not rude, it’s polite. Polite and respectful. Respectful and humble. And bold. I’m saving you time. Those seconds add up. I like to keep a running tally of all of the time I’ve saved throughout my life by cutting short the chit-chat. Let me just tell you, it’s a lot of time. I have it all on an Excel spreadsheet. Once I’ve determined that I’ve saved a week’s worth of time solely from talking fast and getting straight to the point, I’m going to go on a week-long vacation. It’s going to feel great. It’s going to be a vacation totally outside of regular time, each second of relaxation and leisure a result of me not wasting time making everyone else listen to unnecessary filler words and fake pleasantries.

  When I’m working as a waiter, I find that people from out of state (definitely out of the tri-state area) often mistake my talking fast for being rude. It’s not rudeness, although, if you point it out to me more than twice that I’m talking too fast, it’ll probably turn into me being genuinely pissed-off. I’ll go up to a table and say, “Hey, how’s everybody today?” If someone’s from out of town, they take this moment hostage and, without even having looked at their menu, start asking me ridiculous questions, or non-questions.

  “We’re from out of town! We’re on vacation! Where are you from?”

  I just want to say something like, “I’m from right here. I’m from this restaurant. I walked out of the kitchen just a second ago. And I came over here to see what you’d like to eat.”

  But that would definitely be seen as rude, and so I’m forced to play along with this inane banter, while I’m standing there chatting, all of my other tables’ food is getting cold in the window, so by the time this table releases me from the bonds of this annoying pseudo-conversation, now I really am in a rush, and you want to see fast talking? Well, I can crank it up a few notches and talk really, really fast. I could probably start reading what I’ve written so far and catch up to this sentence, beating myself, getting here before I even have a chance to finish it.

  The worst is when people ask me for a list of something, like flavors of ice cream or brands of soda, these lists that I have memorized in my head, that I could repeat back to you without even having to disturb the conscious parts of my higher brain. And I’m not slurring my words either. My enunciation is spot on. But if I rattle off a list, however clearly, if people think it’s too fast, they’ll get it in their heads that
I’m not taking a vested interest in their wellbeing, that they’re on vacation and they don’t like being talked to so fast, brushed aside, not wanting to hear about where you’re from, what’s wrong with you, son, you’re going to have to slow down a little bit and repeat that one more time.

  So I’ve trained myself when saying certain things, things that I say over and over and over and over again, like, what’s in your hamburger, or can you explain this dish, or which way to the subway, that I make myself say it like I’m talking in purposeful slow motion. But it just comes out all strained, like you can hear me mentally and almost physically trying to force back the flow of words coming out of my mouth. It just sounds like I’m constipated or holding back a violent form of rage, or trying not to sneeze even though my face is all crinkled and it’s obvious I have to sneeze and, just let it out man, you’ll feel better, why hold it in, but I’m not holding anything, I’m just trying really hard to talk slow.

  And also, when I talk slow enough, I overthink how I pronounce things. A lot of time I’ll say things different slowly, different than I would ever say anything at a regular pace. (Butter Pea-Can? Butter Puh-Kahn? I don’t remember which one is mine. How do I say it?) So lately I’ve been trying to say the individual words in my regular fast pace, but I put a conscious pause of a second or two in between each word. It sounds a little robotic, like how a robot might respond to you if you asked it what type of vegetables come in your chef salad, because I need to know every single vegetable, because even the slightest presence of some taste that I find objectionable, no matter how small, no matter how subtle the flavor, well, I just can’t have that, and I’ll send it back. Did you say mushrooms? You really should slow down.

  But the robot thing works best of all because at least it’s not rude. I find if I smile constantly, the whole time, then people are more likely to just think there’s something wrong with me, something a little off, nothing sinister, maybe a little sinister, but the sinister is visibly being forcibly held back. This guy’s doing the absolute best that he can to at least try to pretend like he’s smiling at you, like he wants very badly for you to have a good time, because you can tell, because he looks so uncomfortable, because he wants you to be comfortable instead of himself. So whatever, at least he’s not rude.

  Being the bigger person

  I’m really good at winning any argument or fight. Usually I have the facts on my side, but sometimes the facts aren’t enough. Sometimes I’ll find myself arguing with someone who simply refuses to consider my point of view. Maybe emotion gets in the way and clouds better judgment. Or the fight might be purely theoretical, philosophical, or a contest of ideas rather than something grounded in the real world. But there’s a different strategy to win every different type of confrontation.

  Let’s say I’m butting heads with someone at work. It happens every now and then, a lot of people doing many different things at the same time. It’s pretty easy to unintentionally get in somebody else’s way. If it’s especially busy, both people involved might not have time to thoroughly step back and assess the situation.

  Say I bump into somebody else, or, somebody else bumps into me. I always like to let the other person react first, so I can best judge how to respond. I might get a curt, “Watch it,” or a cold, under-the-breath muttering. To me, this is a little selfish of the other person. They clearly want to engage, to express their frustrations, but they only want to do it a little bit, halfway, just enough to make a claim that they were wronged, but not loud enough to really deserve a rebuttal. Maybe the response was so quiet that I barely heard it at all.

  But I definitely heard it. So I’ll go back with a louder, “Watch what? I was here first!” It doesn’t matter who was where first. What is important is that I’m staking a claim to my own space. And by saying it in a voice loud enough for everyone else to hear, I’m making a public challenge to the idea that anything could have been my fault at all. This is going to continue in either one of two directions. Most likely, the other person is going to let it go, having not expected me to respond so forcefully. But maybe this person is of an equally strong will. He could step right up and say something like, “Oh yeah?”

  You might think my next move would be to get even louder, to say, “Yeah!” for everyone to hear. But that’s never the way to go. At this point, other people might start noticing, and somebody might try to get involved and play peacemaker. That wouldn’t resolve anything. The wound would remain open, ripe for infection. No, this must be settled now. But I’ve already escalated as far as I want to escalate. What if this guy gets crazy and pushes me or something? I’ve already drawn him out as far as I want to, verbally. There’s nothing to gain in trying to lure him out physically.

  So it’s at this point, now that it’s loud enough where everyone else knows we’re having a disagreement that’s getting a little more heated than usual, I’ll say in the same loud voice, but really steady and calm this time, “You’re right. I’m sorry. I’m going to be the bigger person and apologize. It was my fault.” And then I’ll extend my hand in peace and smile a really big smile.

  Now everyone knows for sure that I’m the bigger person. I’m willing to not let the small stuff get in the way of a productive workplace environment. I respect my coworkers so much that I don’t want to involve them in all of this unnecessary drama. And everyone’s looking at the both of us, this other guy clearly still upset, reluctant even to take my hand, and me standing tall, tranquil, ready to let bygones be bygones.

  When everyone is talking about it later, they’ll say, “Well, whatever started this fight in the first place, it clearly couldn’t have been Rob’s fault. He’s too mature to get drawn into such petty squabbles. Just look at the way that he expertly diffused the situation!”

  And when the other person takes my hand, I’ll give him the strongest handshake ever. It’ll be one of those handshakes that’s definitely way too firm. Maybe it even hurts a little, maybe his knuckles start to buckle under the sheer stress. But everyone respects those handshakes, so what is he going to say? That I’m shaking too hard? He’ll look like a total wimp. And I’ll look him right in the eye while I hold my stone grip just a second too long, barely noticeable to anybody else, but he’ll get the message.

  Or maybe he won’t take my hand. Maybe he’ll look at me and say something like, “Whatever man!” and storm away. And I’ll just be left there hanging. But that’s fine, because I’ll look like an even bigger person. I’ll just stand there and shrug it off, the fact that he slighted my apology not even registering on my face. I’ll look at my coworkers and be like, “Man, what’s his problem?” And we’ll all kind of laugh to ourselves lightly, but not too hard, because that guy is walking this way again, and while I want him to think that we were all laughing about him, I don’t want him to have any proof. I just want him to see the very end of our smiles, so that if he asks anybody about it later, we can all say that he’s acting crazy, that we don’t know what he’s talking about.

  Quarterly Performance Review

  I know that we told you we weren’t going to have any performance reviews this quarter, but here we are. What’s the deal, right? Well, upper management decided to trick the staff, to lull you all into a false sense of security. We wanted you to work as if you thought nobody was watching, writing everything down, timing your bathroom breaks, keeping track of how many bathroom breaks you’re taking during the day. What we were really after, besides a comprehensive analysis of your bathroom activity, was to observe you during these past few months closer than ever. What are your natural work habits like? How are you likely to perform while we’re not watching?

  So, yeah, surprise! One thing corporate has specifically mentioned that I ask you is, why are you using so much hand soap during your bathroom breaks? Good personal hygiene is certainly of the utmost importance to management, but do you really think the amount of soap you’re using is proportional to the amount of work you’re getting done here? Before you object,
I should let you know that we installed tracking devices into each soap dispenser, giving us an unprecedented look into the soap usage of all of our employees and, while we’re pleased to inform you that your time spent in the bathroom falls well within acceptable parameters, we’re alarmed at the disproportionate amount of soap you use after each trip.

  Why are your hands so dirty anyway? In the future, let’s try to keep it down to one or two pumps on the soap dispenser, and even though I just said one or two pumps, try to choose just one pump, OK?

  Which brings me to my second point: microwave usage. Management might seem pretty lenient in regard to its office kitchen policy, but I’m afraid that some of you lower-level employees are abusing our complimentary appliances. Specifically, we’ve noticed that every morning, you bring in some sort of Tupperware container filled with homemade lunch, and then you drop off your food in the office refrigerator.

  Fine.

  But come lunchtime, you have this habit of heating up your food in the microwave. Does this say power level ten? If you wanted your food to be hot, why are you spending so much time keeping it cold in the fridge? Freon doesn’t grow on trees, you know. Maybe you wouldn’t have to use the microwave for a whole four minutes if you would leave your pasta out on your desk all day. Listen, the company isn’t made of kilowatt-hours. You’re going to have to be a little more conscientious with how you utilize corporate resources, not to mention corporate refrigerator space. You know what? Let’s just go ahead and say that, from now on, rule of thumb, no more than two minutes on the microwave. Let’s call it an unwritten rule. But in case you forget, I’ll have the temp post some signs in the kitchen.