Archive for Super Tales
Supers and “Supering”
“Wear the old coat and buy the new book.” -Austin Phelps
There are those grasping souls who, no matter how much they have, want more. And will do whatever conniving and deceiving they must do to get it. To them, how they get it is unimportant. It’s all in the possessing. Well, also in the flaunting. But flaunting is a whole ‘nother story.
You know the type? Lots of stuff is good. Cheap is bad — but inexpensive, now that’s getting religion. Getting it free is like finding out that getting religion will also make you smart, beautiful, famous AND rich. And getting over on someone to get it for free, well, that’s nirvana wrapped in heaven inside of Shangri-la. We all know someone like this. There are some such souls in our fair city, sad to say. In the upper west side luxury condo where I live and work, they bought and moved into Apt. 8D many years before I was hired as the super.
Now, to me at least, there are degrees. If a very poor person is seen grabbing and grasping, motivated by need more than greed, by wanting to better his life and that of his family, well, that’s one thing. But to see a human – who already has everything – want still more, not even allowing him/herself to be on familiar terms with the fact that he already has more than he needs… that’s another story altogether. Here’s one such short story:
I was taking my afternoon coffee one day about a year ago, when my doorman called me to say there was an emergency in 8D. She was yelling into the phone all high-pitched and scared and nervous: “Tell the super to come up here right away, my diamond wedding ring fell down the drain and I want it back immediately.”
Well, this day was beginning to look like it just might have an upside. A five minute job AND a nice healthy tip was almost assured. AND, I might possibly be up for hero of the year for a change (supers don’t get that enough). I went up when my break was over, separated the plumbing under the bath vanity, and poured the water into a container.
No diamond ring in sight. Suddenly, the under-sink plumbing I was holding in my hand had DISASTER stamped all over each piece in big scary lettering.
She was too upset to stand there and watch, but Slippery Finger’s husband was keeping his evil, ah, make that eagle eye on the proceedings. We were both stunned about where the ring was not. Mr. Slippery called Mrs. into the bathroom, and we both queried her about running water AFTER the ring had slipped off her finger. Definitely not, she said. She had made sure that after the ring had slipped off, she shut the faucet immediately and called for help.
Momentarily I didn’t know what to do. I had heard rumors about these nice people, under whose grand hospitality I was now pinned, but being new to the building I had no actual experience to explain that hairy feeling forming in the pit of my stomach. They had been suspected of staging incidents before (at least one of which involved a former employee and expensive jewelry), and this was starting to take on the look and feel of one of those. I unholstered my flashlight and peered down the drain with concentration to summon the plumbing gods. There appeared to be something hanging there, on the stopper lever, but I couldn’t be sure, and from my angle I could NOT see a diamond.
I asked Mr. Slippery for a wire hanger, and sweated through opening it up, wondering what good could come of this incident (or was it accident), and was I really as screwed as I was starting to feel? As I started probing the drain with the wire, I heard the unmistakable plunk of metal against plastic, of a heavy diamond ring hitting the bottom of the green plastic bucket below. Oh yes, it WAS going to be a good day after all. Ms. Slippery Ring Finger chirped and gasped loudly in recognition, as if to say, “That’s it, that’s it! I’ve heard that sound before!”
It had been there all along, having somehow hung itself, waiting for light persuasion from my wire poke before giving itself up. I was concurrently wiping the sweat off my forehead and saying a prayer of thanks for not getting the blame for inadvertently disposing of (or worse, stealing) a very expensive diamond ring, and all the while plotting how I could get out of there as fast as possible, when the husband stuffed $50 in bills into my hand. Hey now. Not only was I the hero of the story for a change, but I got some nice change to boot.
Before escaping, I commented on how beautifully the bathroom had turned out – new vanity, new mirrors, new tiles on the floor and wall – it looked GORGEOUS, and expensive. They both thanked me and smiled, Yes, they were very happy; the work had been completed just days before.
“Money can’t buy friends, but it can get you a better class of enemy.” — Spike Milligan
Three days later, the contractor who had just completed that tile work in 8D stopped by the building. He looked very irritated and frustrated, like he had just wakened with a sour stomach. “I thought you were finished here –what happened?” I asked him. “They told me yesterday that they don’t like the tile, that it’s uneven in color and installed poorly, and they want something done about it,” he said with a frustrated frown.
I was shocked. SHOCKED! Aside from the obvious (they HAD said, had they not, that they JUST LOVED the work – or had I dreamt it?), which caused my initial stunned astonishment, I couldn’t help but think: Why is it that anyone bids on, and accepts, a job in ANY building in this City without speaking to the super first? Who knows better than the super (and of course other staff who have prime contact with residents) whether or not the person or persons they will be spending lots of effort and time with – many thousands of dollars over many months in most cases, sometimes even millions of dollars and more than a year in others — is honest, a good business person, above board, and will pay the bill at the end?
There has been much drivel written in magazine articles and books – okay, some of it good — about finding a good contractor, much less about finding a good client. But a contractor could help himself and his sour stomach many times over by asking a few pointed questions of relatively disinterested parties (the super, the doormen, the handyman maybe?). In this case, if he had asked me, I would have told him to run — not walk — away from this particular potential client.
He never gave himself a running chance.
Teachable Moments (Show and Tell)
“It’s too bad that the only people who know how to run a country are busy driving cabs and cutting hair.” – George Burns
Never mind the country, sometimes that’s how I feel about my job. To paraphrase Mr. Burns: Too bad the only people who know how to run a building are busy lawyering and brokering stocks and dealing art.
Every super knows at least this one thing by experience, and knows it very well: New York City apartment dwellers don’t know squat about what supers do, nor how they do it. But the residents in my building think they know what supers do, and what they’re absolutely, positively sure of is that their super is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And that the best time to call to set up an appointment to get a window blind fixed is after work is finished for the day and I’m taking a nap, because I was up late the night before taking care of yet another problem. Or that a toilet running on is an emergency that should be fixed right away, even if “right away” is somewhere between 9 pm and midnight.
And isn’t it funny that they all seem to be smart enough to know that IF I’m stupid enough to answer my phone after hours, their excuse for calling at a late hour will be that they thought my voicemail would pick up? Did someone learn their lessons too well in law school, or what?
Yes, what tenants, condo and co-op owners absotively, posolutely do not know about the super life would fill many encyclopedic volumes. Still, sometimes it’s our fault.
“The difference between a smart man and a wise man is that a smart man knows what to say, a wise man knows whether or not to say it.” – Frank M. Garafola
Sometimes it is our fault because often we fail to find that teachable moment, and take advantage of it. A teachable moment? Let’s define a teachable moment, for our purposes here, as that period between the time a question is asked by a resident (usually in the form of a demand, i.e., why can’t someone — read: the super — DO something about yadda yadda yadda?) and that time when we either come up with a viable answer, or a quick answer intended to take the edge off a tough conversation — or we lose patience and walk away — or… worse.
Sometimes it’s our fault because we don’t take advantage of the opportunities that present themselves to educate our residents about what we do. Yes, we’re very busy. There’s too much to do in one day’s time, and that to-do list ain’t getting any shorter, is it?
But sometimes we need to just stop and take some time to ‘splain what needs ‘splainin’.
Most of the time, residents are not clueless about what we do and why we do it because they want to be. In many instances it’s a matter of no one ever before having taken the time to teach them the facts. No one previously has taken the time to instruct, when that teachable moment has come along. Consequently, the ignorance is at best perpetuated — often inaccuracies and fallacies are added to a person’s brain databank — and at worst, built upon with lies.
Since when can a super, many of us with little formal education, teach a lawyer ANYTHING? Since there are “teachable moments” – that’s when. I know we’re not teachers — we’re building maintenance workers. We’re supers first, and teaching isn’t even a close third, and I’m not advocating being a fulltime teacher. For most of us that’s not an alternative. I’m simply suggesting that we look for those small moments when we can pass along something helpful – helpful to them and to us.
All of us, whether we realized it at the time or not, have had those moments presented to us in gift wrap and a nice bow. All we had to do was seize the moment that was presented to us. If we look patiently – and don’t overreact, or underreact — we can find these moments.
Case in point: I live and work in a property of a whole bunch of million dollar condos on the upper west side, on a great old tree-lined block in a beautiful and semi-quiet neighborhood. Most of the owners in my building work in high pressure jobs downtown, and spend too little time at home. But when they are at home they don’t want to be bothered by the peculiar quirks of the building, or little things like a toilet getting stopped up. So the babysitter – sorry, I mean the super — gets called, even if it’s late.
We know that it doesn’t take a super to unclog a toilet. Last time I looked in the mirror, I did not even remotely resemble a plunger, not even when I was wearing my rattiest baseball cap.
Hard as it is to believe, a few of these people never learned how to properly use a plunger. Possibly more accurately and to the point, they were never TAUGHT how to use a plunger. And let’s face it, most of these people are NOT self-taught ANYTHING – they spent a lot of time in ivy league classrooms in the past, no?
To be sure, it’s only a few who, although they own their home, know exactly zilch about taking care of it, (one woman once told me that she had no time to do anything in her home and no time to learn it, after all, the reason she lives in a condo is because she can hire someone to take care of everything – pretty much a word for word quote) but in my building they are exactly the type who would not think twice to call me after hours and expect me to show up on their doorstep, with a plunger and a smile, in under a minute flat.
Quite evidently, no one ever took the time to demonstrate the basics to, and enlighten, some people.
When my kid was in kindergarten, she often had to bring something to “show and tell”. Bring a found object or possession of yours to school the next day, show it to the class and talk about what it means to you, or what you can learn to do with it.
Well, after about a year of unclogging toilets and flipping breakers because of overloaded circuits, many if not all at immensely inopportune times, I realized that I was missing something. You might say I had entered a teachable moment myself.
It began to sink into my thick cranium that I needed to take matters into my own hands and take the time – next time, to show and tell. Unstop the toilet, yes, in a timely manner, yes. But also manage the little visit. Maneuver to have them watch, and show them how it’s done. Oh, and work into the conversation that a plunger can be picked up at the hardware store for just a few dollars and kept nearby for just such an “emergency”.
Manipulation? A little manipulation of the situation can go a long way. I did just that a few weeks later, and I haven’t been back to unclog a toilet there since – now many months. Hmmm, come to think of it, I haven’t been back to the apartment to do anything in many months. Yet the owners are friendlier and seem to have more respect for me than ever before.
“A teacher is one who makes himself progressively unnecessary.” – Thomas Carruthers
Have I actually done something right for a change? Yes, I think I have, finally. I did what I woulda shoulda coulda done a long time ago. I found that teachable moment, and — instead of overreacting or, just as bad, underreacting — I taught.
Seemingly insignificant and exceedingly small, yet so important, I finally learned what my kid learned in kindergarten lo these many years ago.
I found an object I’m familiar with, and I went off to show and tell.
The Price is Right
“…After we pull the pin, Mr. Grenade is NOT our friend!”
I had to fire my doorman Derek last week. To be perfectly honest, I’ve wanted to do so for a long time. He’s an inveterate suckup and he makes all of us in New York City multi-family building support look bad. To put it very succinctly, Derek allows the almighty dollar to dictate how he treats people.
Those who tip him big at holiday time, and even more so for those who “remember him” sufficiently throughout the year, these people he treats royally. Those who tip small or not at all, to him these are a royal pain in the asterisk. He ignores them, speaking to them only when spoken to, helping out only when formally asked.
Derek’s been in the building for many years, predating most of the present owners here by several years; me by many. He knew the lives of most residents intimately. Even grew close to a few.
Adored by those he treated well, this case was especially hard for all of those involved because of an interesting phenomenon. Funny (in a strange, bizarre, odd kind of way) how money, thrown around in the right amounts, patterns and dimensions sometimes makes the relationship of one person to another resistant to a lot of truth.
There’s a weird kind of “one hand washes the other” going on in these relationships: A resident tips well. The tippee treats the tipper extra well in return, going that extra mile frequently and with gusto. The high-tipping resident will come to deem this individual, over time, a great person. He’s so kind and obliging, so knowledgeable, so on the ball, so right on time with his helpfulness. He must be a very nice, and good, person.
I’ve seen it with celebrities and other very well-to-do people also. The money they have is often used strategically to get what they want – as time goes on it happens without so much as a second thought by them. Consequently, much is hidden from them. They’re blinded to much of what is going on around them, because the money they put out serves to insulate them. Is that the way they want it? I’m certain that for many the answer is “yes” .
“No one does anything from a single motive.” –Samuel Taylor Coleridge
But what the tipper often cannot see and understand, if the tipped one is not simply doing his job because it’s his job to do, but instead lavishing extra consideration and attention only on those people who treat HIM very well, is a very self-evident fact: that this person isn’t a good person because he’s a good person in his own right, but he becomes a good person for monetary reasons. In other words: If the price is right.
Well, isn’t that enough? You may say it is; it doesn’t matter WHY you do the right thing. It’s enough that you DO the right thing.
I respectfully disagree. This isn’t true in any field, but especially not in the service field. Why? For me, there are two reasons, probably both selfish in part. One reason has a lot to do with the field of work in which we see ourselves, the other has much more to do with the class of humanity in which we think of ourselves as being.
Number one: it makes me look bad. If a person in our field does the right thing only because of what HE gets out of it, how does that make us all look? Do we devalue ourselves to the simple level of doing our jobs only for the loot, instead of doing the right thing for the sake of — well, doing the right thing?
I don’t like getting painted with the same broad strokes as the individual who does the right thing only when someone is watching — or doling out the greenbacks. I’d like to think I’m going beyond that. To me, that’s not a good enough reason to do something. But, quite broadly, it is how we in this field are quite often seen. It’s our fault. We allow people to think that we will not do what we should do until we are slipped paper in sufficient amperage or voltage to persuade us to do what is our job to do all along! Or because we irrationally think we can or should intimidate or shame or coerce people into giving us the off-the-books income we somehow “so richly deserve”.
“Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.
Folks, I’ll get off my soapbox in a minute, but first this: we shouldn’t be like that, collectively or individually. If we do a great job and the recipient wants to reward with a tip, we can and should graciously accept it in the spirit of “a job well done”, especially when we go ‘way beyond the call of duty. For many of us, “going beyond” is part and parcel of every day. But we should not require or demand a tip in order to do what is already our job to do, and for which we already receive fair compensation.
Years ago a handyman who worked for me would gripe throughout the year about this horrible tenant and that bad resident. “They’re cheap. I don’t like working for them. They don’t tip well.” He would hide from any or all of them if he saw them coming. But at holiday time he was hanging out in the lobby, literally his big bad rotund self would hold down a chair in the lobby, hour after hour waiting for the envelopes to be handed to him – WHILE HE WAS BEING PAID TO WORK! What is wrong with THAT picture?
I wondered at times just how many people thought I was that kind of person also, since I was his boss, and I ordered some changes in his behavior.
Number two: He looks untrustworthy when he doesn’t treat a person well. Maybe some people don’t think of this in dealing with people – maybe more should: If you can’t trust a person’s motives, what is it about that person that you CAN trust?
Now, I did NOT manufacture anything against Derek, nor was I looking for something. He DID bring this on himself. Still, it looked possible for a day or two that I might have to eat the whole episode and bring him back. I didn’t know if my building manager would agree with what I did, nor did I know if my manager’s boss would agree. And certainly, working in a condo at the pleasure of the owners who are also in many ways the “bosses”, I didn’t know if any — or enough of them — would agree with what I did. Especially those on the Board who have the final say.
Some residents were indeed prompted to come to me and spill their guts on what I did, even before asking for and digesting all the facts. And I understood that there was a vast affection for Derek by some, and some of their children were deeply attached to him, having grown up with him coming in and out of the building all their lives.
Even further, there was the union to contend with. Dealing with individuals at the union is generally okay, but dealing with “the bureaucracy” can be tricky at best, a death wish at worst.
Still and all, firing Derek had to happen. Not because he was found sleeping on the job time after time, and given warning after warning (which he was). Not because he had a habit of coming to work late and blaming the trains (which he did, over and over). Certainly not because he would often stand outside smoking a cigarette with his back to the door, completely oblivious to who was coming in and going out, unable to hear the ringing phone (which he also did).
“I’ve always felt it was not up to anyone else to make me give my best.” — Akeem Olajuwon
And certainly not because he was a nonstop suckup, doing his duty exclusively (and so obviously) for the money, treating people differently solely on his perception of whether or not they treated him well first. Yes, it was egregious and it was disappointing and it was shameful to see, day after day, month after month, treating people differently based on how much they put out.
But all of that was, in the end, a moot point.
What finally did him in was his lack of self control in general, and specifically his temper. He and a coworker got into an argument, which led to a fight. Derek got angry, lost control, and took the coworker out. He forced my hand; I took him out. I’ve never regretted it for a millisecond.
The Nesting Instinct
“A good home must be made, not bought.” — Joyce Maynard
Some call it the nesting instinct, some call it the bubble phenomenon, and some call it much worse things. I call it fun to watch. I see it every time someone new moves into my upper west side condo.
A family closes on an apartment and eventually moves in. For me and for my staff, that’s when the fun and entertainment begins. They will complain to me, their new super, about anything and everything under the sun. Things I can do something about and things over which I have no control. I’ve gotten complaints about the noise from garbage trucks and other sundry early morning traffic. Complaints about the next door neighbor’s dog barking. About the ease with which one can hear the couple fighting next door.
Depending on the personalities involved and the time it takes for the new residents to get settled, they can make my life extremely busy and very, shall we say, interesting for me – for anywhere from a few days to several months.
With real estate prices in Manhattan spiking as it is in many neighborhoods, there has been an unusually heavy turnover in my building recently. Older owners are cashing out and moving on to greener pastures, younger ones are moving in.
The best thing about it all is this: I have seen it enough times to know that this soaring state of nesting is a very temporary phenomenon. It just SEEMS at the time that it will be forever. It never is. Like a hurricane, it eventually does blow over.
“When you respond to life, that’s positive; when you react to life, that’s negative.” — Zig Ziglar
Moving day comes, and until they’re completely settled in it’s anywhere from a few days to a few weeks, depending on how busy the new residents are in their jobs and extracurricular activities.
They come and giddily introduce themselves to you on the day of closing or shortly thereafter, are in deliriously high spirits and want you to know that they will be the best residents you’ve ever known, will work with you and for you and put in a good word about you when they get on the board. They will work to make life great in their new building and you’re sure they will be your best friends for life.
After moving in, all bets are off.
Here’s the catch. Nothing is ever quite perfect, even with the wonderful, ideal apartment in the perfect neighborhood in the immaculate building in which I live and run. For most purchasers, it’s too easy to overlook the small idiosyncrasies and foibles or the too unfinished state of the home they have just bought. That is, until the day after move-in and the first mortgage payment looms. Reality hits them between the eyes and that tension headache creeps in as they anticipate writing that monthly maintenance check for the rest of their natural lives.
God forbid you are busy with the needs of other residents during this crucial time and cannot address their “emergencies” (anything they want done right now) immediately (yesterday). You will quickly become the villain, and fodder for complaints to your manager. This is the time to set aside all but the direst of emergencies and lavish all the warmth and attention you and your staff can muster to their needs.
Forget their possible buyer’s remorse, you can rapidly become sorry your paths have crossed, and in spades. You get to believing that these people are going to be impractical jerks, and are going to hound you to your grave, making unfeasible and unworkable demands on you and your hapless staff ad nauseum. You fear that your life will become a series of choices where on the one hand you are either catering to their needs and theirs alone, thus drawing the ire and disgust of all the other residents, or on the other, avoiding these nice new residents at all costs. In a year you will have to leave the building and take a job in New Jersey because you have had no time for anyone else but them, consequently everyone else hates you and will never smile at you again – OR tip you in any month ending in “ber”.
“You don’t really understand human nature unless you know why a child on a merry-go-round will wave at his parents every time around — and why his parents will always wave back.” –William D. Tammeus
It’s the nesting phenomenon at work. It’s only temporary. This too shall pass. No one ever said being a super is easy, but it’s not impossible either. And most people, including your new residents, aren’t crazy. They’re just nesting.
It is human nature to fear change, and moving is one of the most life-changing experiences humans can put themselves through. For producing stress in a person’s life, it’s right up there with having a baby and starting a new job. I’ve heard it from more than one person, including from my own mouth, that moving is the worst of times in life.
Since your new move-ins are new to the building and to you, they don’t know you – not like the other residents know you. The long time residents understand that you’re a rational, caring person, and know that you will respond to their requests in good time. Emergencies – the real kind – will get taken care of immediately. The other “emergencies” will get taken care of also, but will take just a bit longer. But their needs will be met, they have not made a mistake taking an apartment in this building, the super is not a raging idiot who cares less than a whit about them and their problems, and their lives will go on and indeed, will get even better. It will take some time to realize this, but it does always happen. “This too shall pass,” as the wise man said.
It will just take some time. But how much time will be needed? Depending on the personalities involved, the time it takes you and your staff to accommodate, acquiesce and meet or exceed their demands will be very short and relatively painless, or it can become several excruciating months of hell. But if you can remind yourself during this time that this too will become routine to them, and therefore no more a matter of panic or complaint, you will do yourself and your staff a favor. Their life in your building does at some point become routine at last, and your life also becomes…well, boring again.
Sure, it’s nice to get everything as you like it in your apartment, your building, your life. But when you’re finished, what else is there? What’s next? You have to set new goals or your life will become stale and boring.
Because let’s face it, it’s these times that make it all worthwhile. After all, it’s rarely the goal – the destination – that is the most fun. It’s mostly the trip – the getting to the destination – that is the most rewarding.
Happy trails!
One’s Garbage – Another’s Treasure
When is the life of a super like a treasure hunt? I’ll tell you in a minute, but first, let me be holier than thou for a minute. I’m glad I’m not just a clueless super. I’m thankful I’m a person who has a life beyond running a house of homes for, umm, well-to-do people. I’m pleased that I’m happy in my work, even if I’ve been fortunate to get a decent liberal arts education.
Yes it was a state institution, but I won’t tell anyone I was once in an institution if you won’t. I’m grateful that there is more to my life than what I do from 8 to 4. (Sshhh-hh, please don’t wake up my residents from their dream — they think I’m on duty 24 hours).
In my other life, I collect books. I love to read, and have found Classic American Literature to be the savior from my daily actions of sucking up to spoiled rich people — of smiling when I want to curse or laughing when I want to scream.
Okay, now that I got THAT rot out of my system for oh, about the life of a roach, let’s get on to something else you often find in the garbage besides roaches: treasures.
“All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsion, habit, reason, passion, and desire.” – Aristotle
I found a new Logitech Cordless keyboard and mouse in the garbage the other day. Wow. Well, it wasn’t IN the garbage. NEXT TO the garbage. Still, someone had thrown it out. I can’t believe a computer user would buy a new cordless keyboard and mouse, try to set it up, run into some slight though possibly real trouble, and instead of calling tech support and find out if one is working with a defective item (or not), then if YES returning it for a new one, and if NO attempting to divine the real problem … yeah yeah I know, forget it. Time is money.
A free cordless mouse and keyboard. In the original box. It took me about 30 minutes to determine whether or not it worked: set it up on my machine, install the software, test it, pronounce it fit for use on a super’s computer (sure, some of us have lower standards – and I may be one of them, but nevertheless, it does work just fine, thank you much). Wow! Oh, and did I mention it works perfectly?
Sometimes the life of a super in a big condo property on the upper west side can be more like a treasure hunt, than repairs and dealing with disillusioned, sometimes disgruntled, occasionally spoiled rich bambinos.
The problem, I found, was two fold. First, the directions that came with the software were (gasp!) wrong, which in essence, called for unplugging the old hardware and plugging in the new hardware, after which you shut off the computer and reboot, then install the software. But how are you going to install the software if the computer doesn’t recognize the hardware? (Without a mouse OR a keyboard it’s hard to communicate with a computer, no?) It didn’t work – even with XP Pro, at least in my case, because I tried it, just to prove them wrong. Isn’t it great to be right, even IF being right makes things tougher for you?
And second, the batteries in the mouse were installed backward. That’s it. Two items, nothing else.
“Definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over again, yet expecting different results.” –Unknown Author
So, instead of following the directions again, I installed the software first, then installed the hardware, which the computer recognized with the help of the software, and away we went. Quick, almost painless. And did I mention it was free?
Sometimes I can’t believe that anyone smart enough to be so rich can also be so dumb. But hey, good for me. And the truth is, of course, that you don’t have to be smart to be rich. If that were the case, few of the people in my condo would be rich. And sometimes we’re all too smart to be anything but stupid. We let our experiences, good and bad, get in the way of learning a new thing quickly, because we THINK we already know the right way, simply based on past experience.
I’ve done it before, as a super and in other niches of my life. And no doubt I’ll do it again once or twice before hitting my expiration date. I’ve done a new thing in an old way, expecting a previous outcome because of prior experience, when it would have been more helpful to keep a totally open mind about the new thing I was trying. Because a new way to do a new thing is sometimes the better way.
If one can keep an open mind things can often progress so much more smoothly. Yes, life is much more unpredictable when you make it a habit to keep your mind open to all possibilities. How can it be both? For many of us the question will immediately be: How can things go more smoothly AND be more unpredictable?
For those control freaks among us who have taken pains to tightly control and strictly plan, who deliberate, ponder, meditate and cogitate about every move for a year before making it, it won’t always be unpredictable or smooth. Some cannot have both. Some can only live in one sphere, and they think there is only one huge choice to make, and THAT will make all the difference.
“Don’t be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.” –Ralph Waldo Emerson
I say that making many small choices is better. Yes, there will ultimately be more choices to make, many more small options and selections over which to deliberate, but what is wrong with that? What’s wrong with making many smaller choices every day, as opposed to making one or two huge choices – then having to live with them forever.
Well, maybe it has a bit to do with your comfort level with different stages of unpredictability, but not being able to predict your near future, or how things will turn out, can be a plus. You can actually have more control over your eventualities if you take lots of small options every day, than if you make one or two large choices, then have to stick with them forever and have no more planning and choosing to do down the road.
One of Robert Frost’s greatest poems is about choices. He called it The Road Less Traveled. In it he writes of choosing something over another thing, then looking back later in life and musing on how a choice or series of choices has made the chooser who he or she is, and he sums it all up by saying, “That has made all the difference.”
Allow yourself to be open to new things. Not all is always “cut and dried,” as they say, nor would it be good for you if it was. An old dog can learn new tricks. One man’s garbage really is another man’s treasure sometimes. Occasionally the old sayings hold lots of truth. You know the clichés. They become clichéd because they hold much truth, and so are often repeated.
No matter how much experience we have as supers, we all still have lots to learn – if we stay open to learning. All good to keep in our data bank – and our daily practice – in “supering” and in life.
Finding Happy
“The road to happiness lies in two simple principles: find what it is that interests you and that you can do well, and when you find it, put your whole soul into it — every bit of energy and ambition and natural ability you have.” – John D. Rockefeller III
Happiness is defined differently by dissimilar people. Ask a dozen people what happiness is, and you’ll get 2 dozen opinions about it.
Are you happy? Sure, we can always be happy, right? That is, after all, the way the world works, no?
NO!
Well. Why not? Isn’t happiness guaranteed to all Americans by our Constitution? Actually, no it isn’t. Only the pursuit of happiness is mentioned, and that’s an iffy premise, if you ask me. Just the mention of attempting to try to endeavor to venture to scheme to attain happiness is a very hollow and sketchy promise, if you really think about it.
Everyone can pursue happiness, no matter their station in life, but it doesn’t mean they are given a promise to attain it. Sort of like a dog chasing a car. Any dog can chase a car, but can he catch it? And what would a dog do with a car if he could catch it?
“Happiness is a conscious choice, not an automatic response.” – Mildred Barthel
Pursuing happiness on the outside may be a bit like taking a bath and expecting your heart to come clean. As in all things, happiness, or the definition thereof, depends on your point of view. So what truly is happiness? And why is it important?
The above quote makes it look like happiness can be willed by a person, summoned from within, no matter the outer circumstances. That we choose to be happy, and in due time it will be so. And further, that happiness is not a response to the situations we find ourselves in, to the circumstances of our lives. It seems to be saying, conversely, that those people who may have much in life will not necessarily be happy because of the things they have.
Do not all of us know such people? Surely we all have at least one such person living in our building. A person who was raised in the lap of luxury, who went to all the best schools, has a great job, quite possibly a perfect spouse and family (if there can be such a thing), and takes long vacations in exotic locales. Just one thing wrong: they’re always complaining, never happy. Dour, stern, grim, sour individuals who don’t seem to have a bit of understanding of how life works.
“Happiness is good health and a bad memory.” – Ingrid Bergman
Why is it that we humans go through life seeking happiness, and expecting it to be ours to possess and enjoy? Is it simply that we are reminded of our happiness, or lack thereof, when we hear the words “… pursuit of happiness…” as part of our Constitution? Are we so full of ourselves that we think our country, or our society or culture – or even the family we grew up in – owes us happiness?
“Happiness is always a by-product. It is probably a matter of temperament, and for anything I know it may be glandular. But it is not something that can be demanded from life, and if you are not happy you had better stop worrying about it and see what treasures you can pluck from your own brand of unhappiness.” – Robertson Davies
And by the way, how do these questions apply to property management?
Exactly. Sometimes I find myself thinking, if only that awful person in 6A were gone, I could be really content and happy in this job. This person is such a tyrant, such a needy jerk, such a bombastic ass, or such a baby, and if only I could be rid of her or him, I would be happy.
Or, if I made just $20,000 more per year, or have more time to vacation (or could just AFFORD a vacation), I’d be happy.
Of course deep down I know it isn’t true. It really isn’t how people treat me that make me happy or unhappy. I know that it’s my reaction to how people treat me, that my happiness comes from inside me, not from another person’s love or admiration or respect or thanks, and that a lack thereof means I’m a bad person in dire straits. In other words, it isn’t them – it’s me.
“Most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.” – Abraham Lincoln
And it isn’t how much money I make, really, that means I can be happy – or unhappy, or what kind of benefits I enjoy or where I get to vacation. Or the car I might drive.
Do you enjoy your work? Like what you’re doing? Feel reasonably good about your level of expertise in your chosen field? Then you’re quite probably well on your way to being as happy as you can be.
Wow, really? You’re thinking, is that all there is?
“Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.” – Mahatma Gandhi
Well, what more do you want out of your work? Is there any truly good feeling better than feeling good about yourself? Of doing a job well, and having a sense of accomplishment and well-being to match? I for one relish the sense of finishing a job and having it end well.
Sometimes that’s all there is, and sometimes that must be enough.
13 Super Rules
What Supers Wish Residents Knew
Those of us who are resident managers and multi-family building superintendents work daily with a sense of the precariousness of our situations, doing our jobs day to day at the pleasure (or displeasure) of the boards and management companies who hire us.
As such, we are often infinitely more circumspect in what we say to our residents than to each other on staff, and internalize much of our thought processes on resident/maintenance worker relational problems.
This is, for the most part, because most of us have been hired less for our communication skills, more for our handyman skills.
The super who can verbalize well, and put on paper what he or she is really feeling without also feeling intimidated, and without alienating the building’s population, is in the minority.
All of us who have worked in property maintenance for any length of time have a short list - either abstractly and only in our heads, or more concretely on paper or in our PDAs – a catalog of items that we wish those people for whom we work truly understood about us and our chosen vocation.
We all wish we could express it briefly, succinctly and with a sense of humor about it all, and that those around us could read our list and internalize it to the point where everything we say to them is heard, and everything we do for them is seen, as highlighted by “the list”.
Not a list of commandments, but of “rules”. Not written in stone, but in caring and with humor, and with some sensitivity to ourselves as well as the humans we work for in particular, and the human condition in general.
What follows then is one very unoriginal list, gleaned from many years experience and from long associations with several of the best of Manhattan’s long time supers and resident managers:
1. a. If you ask a question you don’t want an answer to, expect an answer you don’t want to hear. b. If you demand an honest answer, don’t be surprised when you get it. It’s only logical, folks.
2. If you think you’re calling after hours, you probably are. Don’t call and ask “Am I calling too late?” It’s a no-win situation for a super to answer that question honestly.
3. If you run out of hot water while taking a shower, it’s not ALWAYS the super’s fault, indeed, it is hardly EVER the super’s fault. Learn to blame the plumbing and heating gods without a second thought and without smirking, just like we do.
4. You can either ask us to do something OR tell us how you want it done, not both. Remember: most supers already know infinitely more about how-to stuff than you ever will.
5. Get thee to the local hardware store, buy a toilet plunger, and learn how to work it. And get to know your way around a circuit breaker box. If you don’t know these things and really do want to know, ask us – we’ll teach you. Otherwise wait until 9am tomorrow morning – we don’t like being interrupted at dinner (or bedtime) for these non-emergency items.
6. If something is not a life-altering emergency, we consider crying to be cruelty. Enough said?
7. Ask for what you want. Understated hints don’t work. Strong hints don’t work. Really obvious hints don’t work. We’re grownups – just say it – we can take it.
8. Come to us with a problem only if you want help solving it. It’s what we do.
9. Bob Vila didn’t need directions from his audience; neither do we. If you want to watch us work, shut up and watch (emphasis on SHUT UP).
10. If you think you MIGHT be too cheap when doling out the holiday tips, you definitely are – by at least 50%.
11. If you think your super’s salary is too high, spend a week following him around and watch him work. You’ll be shocked at his awesome responsibility, and will quickly understand that whatever he’s making, it isn’t nearly enough.
12. “Very handy” does not equal “miracle-worker”. Supers are by definition very handy, but most of the time we are NOT miracle workers, in any true sense of those words.
13. If in doubt, if all else fails or you’ve run out of options and you’re tempted to blame the super again, see rule number 3.
Hots and Hates
“I did not attend his funeral; but I wrote a nice letter saying I approved of it.” – Mark Twain
Several lifetimes ago I had a porter who was an elegant workhorse. He always came to work fifteen minutes early, hardly ever took a sick day, and honestly didn’t seem to like taking vacations. He sometimes worked through at least part of his lunch break, and was always there when he was needed, always easy to find, always cheerful and friendly and open, always looking to see how he could be helpful. Working circles around the other staff members, he didn’t need to be coached, ordered, or supervised, or pushed into getting work done.
I could depend on Melvin to do what needed to be done without my asking, or telling him. He was a dream come true, and a delight to work alongside.
I had a resident in that same lifetime, who, shortly after moving in, developed an irrational emotional attachment to Melvin. Out of the blue she started hating Melvin. Elsie, it was soon learned, was pregnant, her hormones raging. When Melvin delivered a package or cleaning to her apartment, she was as likely to scream at him as anything.
She blamed Melvin when a contractor two floors up started making noise too early for her in the morning. She blamed Melvin when the cleaning didn’t include all of the items she had been expecting.
Kind of reminds me of a bumper sticker I saw on the highway once. It read: I don’t have PMS – I just really hate you.
She was a nightmare. Melvin became nervous around her (who wouldn’t), petrified of her rages, and began to decline to deliver dry cleaning or packages to her apartment anymore. We worked around it. We hoped it was only because she was pregnant, and things would get better post-partum. In the meantime, we decided that all we could do to help was to keep the two as far away from each other as we could.
“Everything is funny, as long as it’s happening to somebody else.” – Will Roger
The weird thing is, it seemed it was only Melvin that Elsie chose to loathe. She was an angel to the rest of us. I couldn’t figure out how such a sweetie could be so nasty, all wrapped up in the same package. It was truly like she was two people. It seemed there was nothing that Melvin did to bring it on, except to exist, to be. And long after the baby was through the terrible twos, she still showed her negative emotional attachment to Melvin.
There is no accounting for taste, as the saying goes. There is also no accounting or explanation for emotional attachments of the positive OR negative kind in some people, at certain times.
Ever wonder why it is that someone suddenly falls in love with someone in a totally improper situation? It might have happened to you as a teen, or since adulthood. Or to someone you know, or knew in the distant past. No matter how inappropriate or damaging it can potentially be, it seems that some folks cannot help themselves, they just fall in love with some one, what I call developing “irrational hots” for somebody else. We see this all the time where a supposedly happily married person suddenly develops an infatuation with a person not their spouse, and all hell breaks loose in their established relationship.
It’s the same way with the hates. No matter how dumb or irrational or destructive it might be to themselves, their families, or others, there are times when someone will develop an irrational and inexplicable hate or extreme dislike for someone else.
“Expecting the world to treat you fairly because you are a good person is a little like expecting the bull not to attack you because you are a vegetarian.” – Dennis Wholey
There’s nothing that the victim, or anyone around the victim, can do to talk him or her out of that sentiment. Since it’s irrational, it cannot be explained, nor can it be justified. Nor can it be changed if it cannot be seen by the perpetrator. It just is, and it’s all too real. It seems impossible to deal with, it’s unfair, it’s unjust, perverse, troubling.
How do you deal with such an illogical and unreasonable emotion, whether it’s directed at you or at one of your staff?
The first thing to realize is this: to the extent that the person on the receiving end has done nothing wrong to deserve such irrational, ignorant unjustified hate, there is nothing that can be done to ameliorate it. That is to say: if it’s irrational, then there is no reason for it. If there’s no reason for it, there is no direct way to combat it.
There is an adage to the effect that time heals all wounds. Of course it isn’t really time that does it. The human creature is such a resilient living thing that in time we heal anyway, some times despite ourselves.
There are many ways to deal with an irrational emotion directed at you or your people. One is simply to say, “I don’t care what you think of me, it bothers me but I will go on doing my job no matter what.” Almost as if to say: If I can achieve notoriety by being hated by the right people, what’s that say about them? Like a badge of honor, it may be something in which to take a perverse pride.
“This is courage in a man: to bear unflinchingly what heaven sends.” – Euripedes
Which is some ways is exactly what Melvin did. He tried to avoid her, because to have invective and blame hurled at you day after day for just doing your job is a huge emotional drain. But he never lost his concentration, never stopped doing his job. Since there was nothing he did to deserve the treatment, he just kept on going as if it wasn’t happening. Didn’t lash out, didn’t strike back. Just kept on keeping on, doing his job.
To keep on doing your job, and doing it well, right through adverse treatment, now that’s the essence of real character.
We all get this to a certain extent at some point or other in our lives; I think supers and other building support personnel in New York City get it more than those in many other service sectors. I get frustrated and discouraged at times and wish to quit, to give up, to stop slogging on and working through the criticism.
It can really work for you to have a thick skin in this vocation, because in a mid-level management job such as this, you are quite often given great responsibility yet have little real power. Consequently, you get the blame for things you have no power to change. You must often look to, and wait patiently (or impatiently) for, others to come to a decision. In many cases you have to wait for someone else to make a decision about the bigger picture before you can make a lesser decision that really should have been made yesterday, or last week, or even last year.
I wonder sometimes if I have skin of sufficient thickness to keep on. I get discouraged and disheartened and wonder, at least momentarily, if I’m in the right business. But keeping on, my friends, is exactly what we must do. Even when you get the blame for something you have no responsibility for. Even when you feel like you never get the recognition for your loyalty, for your honesty, for your great work ethic, for work above and beyond the call of duty, for a particular job well done, even when you get only blame for someone else’s decision that was less than well made.
“To be loved is to be fortunate, but to be hated is to achieve distinction.” – Minna Antrim
Even when the hatred or revulsion or disgust or distaste or aversion or loathing or abhorrence toward you or one of your crew is palpable, and no matter how illogical or unreasonable or difficult or perverse or unjust, this is not the time to quit. Think about it all you want, talk about it if you must, but DON’T DO IT.
This is exactly the time to step back up to the plate, to gain new resolve, and take another crack at bat.
Relaunch
“The only cure for grief is action.” – George Henry Lewes
Last week was the week I got fired. Now that was a kick in the gut. It still hurts. It hurts in particular because of the way it happened, but perhaps more on that later in this piece, after I work through how it happened and lick my wounds a bit more.
Although there are no hard stats that I’m aware of on the number of building superintendents fired, laid off or let go and replaced each year in New York City, I’d be willing to bet it’s in the thousands. It happens a lot. It happens sometimes for good reasons, sometimes for bad. Occasionally no reason is given at all. But it does happen with frequency.
We deal with it. In due time we move on to a new life and job – hopefully a better one – after learning all we can.
To varying degrees in our work as supers and other building maintenance workers, we all slog away with the approval or disapproval of the managers, management firms and condo or co-op boards who hire us.
For those who are union members, it’s a little harder to get fired, but not at all impossible; it can and does happen often. Non-union workers are at the mercy and whim of the people you work for, from your immediate boss to those above him or her, and to the strength of your relationship with them. A strong working relationship with him or her usually helps and often is the glue that holds it all together. But even despite that strength there will be times you find yourself on the outs with a board, or having to deal with a change in ownership or management, or finding that an attempt to seek common ground on an issue has gotten away from all involved.
“Good judgment comes from experience, and often experience comes from bad judgment.” -Rita Mae Brown
There are a thousand different reasons for moving out the door, or for that matter for giving an employee a gentle push out the door.
For supers and resident managers it’s a double whammy. Since most New York City building superintendents get an apartment as part of their compensation package and work situation, you are up for a change in work environment AND living environment all in one fell swoop if you lose a job.
It has all the possibilities of a really traumatic situation for everyone involved, to say the least. That is, IF it’s not handled quite delicately. Sometimes even when it is.
This is even more so if you have a family and they must move to a new apartment in a new neighborhood and attend new schools simply because YOU lost your job, for certainly they did nothing to deserve this. The blame game can get played to its fullest.
There is no doubt that the experience can be very tough, both on you AND on those closest to you.
At the very time you need each other, both can be hurting so much that you either turn on each other in anger and fear of what the future may hold, or you turn away from each other in resentment and an inability to express what you’re feeling, and drift apart. Either one of which can be fatal, and can lead to a family tragedy of epic proportions.
“Yesterday is not ours to recover, but tomorrow is ours to win or lose.” -Lyndon B. Johnson
But, when it does happen, how to react well and make it work for you and your loved ones – not against?
At the very least, for a short time, there is a sense that you want to retaliate in some way. It doesn’t work, nor does it help the situation. You just need to move on, to get another job, and resume your life.
If an overall bad attitude is what got you fired, the first thing to do is work on that. This is not an easy fix, or a quick one. It may be true that your bad attitude comes from having, and cultivating, the wrong reaction to what life throws at you. It isn’t what happens to you – but how you handle what happens to you – that defines who you are.
Even if you were in an impossible work situation and saw no way to save it, you will, if you allow yourself to feel, find that you grieve the loss. It can be quite like a death in the family; it is certainly a new beginning under different circumstances.
Very similarly to the death of a close friend or spouse or family member, you experience grief. Psychologists who have studied people going through these traumatic life changing experiences tell us there are five stages of grief: Denial, Anger, Depression, Bargaining, and Acceptance.
Each time I’ve experienced profound loss – even when it was expected as in the death of someone very old and close to me, I found it well worth my while to try to understand and work through those stages, allowing myself some time to experience and feel each one before moving on to the next.
Each stage is a component of how you will react; the only difference between you and all the others who’ve experienced these stages is the length of time you spend in each one. Some of your reaction depends on your personality, and you can’t quickly change that, if at all. Most of how you deal with it all is up to the depth of determination you muster within yourself to deal with whatever life throws at you.
“There is no squabbling so violent as that between people who accepted an idea yesterday and those who will accept the same idea tomorrow.” –Christopher Morley
Anyway, back to the reasons for this drama. Long story short (and I understand full well that this is just one perspective): the board wanted to take a big, expensive step that I felt was singularly ill-advised, not to mention self-aggrandizing.
I was asked by my manager and board president to express my unvarnished viewpoint (on how it would turn out) when prompted, to enumerate all the reasons why it should not be done, and to put forth a viable alternative. I don’t yet know if they agreed with me, yet somehow thought it would be better received coming from me than from them, or if there was some angling to use this incident against me.
It almost doesn’t matter, because either way the outcome is the same — the only reason I’d like to know the truth about that is for the lesson I might learn for the future.
Sometimes you don’t know how many it will take to whip your butt, but most of the time you do know exactly how many are going to try – this time I knew neither.
I stood up and expressed definitively what I thought and believed to be the best answer, wanting to be neither dishonest to myself nor a shameless shill for the Board. A certain Board member, who must win whether by hook or by crook, disagreed strongly and said so publicly, and demanded my public reaction.
I did as requested, laying my cards on the table and once again said my piece honestly and openly. It wasn’t well received. Apparently strings were pulled, favors called in, arms twisted. Politics gets nasty when individuals believe there is much at stake. Especially if the only thing really at stake is their pride.
“To remain young one must change. The perpetual campus hero is not a young man but an old boy.” – Alexander Chase
It’s not pretty. It never is. But here I am. A big boy, somewhat battered and bruised again; sadder, wiser for the incident. A bit more jaded, cynical, battle-weary and -scarred, tiring of the game. Wondering if it was worth it. But allowing myself to feel, to breathe, to be.
And getting geared up for an alternative future. Next!
Contractors Please Read This!
“The problem is not that there are problems. The problem is expecting otherwise and thinking that having problems is a problem.” – Theodore Rubin
More years ago than I care to admit, on my first paid (and part time) super job, I once made an appointment with a plumber to do non-emergency work in one of the building’s apartments.
Management had given me a specific contractor to call. Although I had strong reservations about this particular plumbing company based as much on the company’s sheer size as on a previous experience with the firm, I made the appointment. I explained that I had a full time job elsewhere and other buildings that I was responsible for, and requested that this work be scheduled so that it could be finished before 2pm, when I would have to leave the building and get on to my other job (the one that paid the bills).
I was led to believe that my predicament was understood, and we agreed on a very specific range of time when a crew would show up the next day, which would, if strictly adhered to, have give me sufficient time to finish the job and be prepared for my 2nd job.
“Time is the scarcest resource and unless it is managed nothing else can be managed.” – Peter F. Drucker
After the plumber was a full hour and a half late, I called the office to inquire when I could expect them. Inexperienced I was aplenty. I should have known, nevertheless, that it was bad form to tick off the scheduling guy, and I MAY have been a tad frustrated and it MAY have shown – just a tad little bit.
“Look, dude, I have over a hundred trucks out there – you’re not the only customer we have – understand?” was his response. “We’ll get to you when we get to you.”
It was all deal with it or get someone else, I don’t care.
I realized it was no use to detail (again) my reasons for having requested a certain slot of time and, silly me, having actually expected them to keep their appointed time, and for being somewhat less than nonchalant when they were late. I swallowed hard and rescheduled the appointment.
One of the regular occurrences that is continuously frustrating to me as a now long time professional resident manager is that a contractor will rarely show up when promised.
“Honest criticism is hard to take, particularly from a relative, a friend, an acquaintance or a stranger.” – Franklin P. Jones
“Call me if your crew is running significantly late, Mack,” I plead. “No problem,” my current plumber’s scheduler invariably says. Each time it’s no problem, and every time it’s me who ends up calling him to inquire, only to be told that the crew can’t possibly arrive at my building today because they’re taking care of a real emergency, or will be three hours later than originally promised.
An hour, two hours late, I’m not making an issue of such tardiness. I have plenty on my plate and don’t have to kill time thinking of things to do and waiting for a contractor to make himself visible.
I think, however, for even the most inattentive and careless, there should be a cutoff point after which the contractor will call if he’s running late, a point at which he will either reschedule or cancel altogether, putting our heads together on a new appointment.
No apology or explanation needed – just call. I shouldn’t always have to pursue him. It’s just common courtesy, no?
The stickiest problems arise when work is scheduled to be done in a resident’s apartment, the resident and the super are both expecting the contractor to show up at the appointed time (again, give or take an hour or so) and it all turns into a no-show. Complications crop up when the contractor doesn’t call to make us believe he cares.
“Fix the problem, not the blame.” – Japanese Proverb
“I’ll be there at 7am on Monday,” a kitchen installer told me last week after I promised I would get him into an empty apartment ahead of the normal building opening time – IF he would promise to make no noise before 9AM. At 8am he still hadn’t shown. I called him. He picked up his cell phone on the second ring and instantaneously spilled a story of co-workers in the hospital and how he couldn’t make it today. Fine.
All I could think of (but didn’t say for the sake of speed, efficiency and getting on to the next item on my too-long to do list) was “Why could you pick up the phone immediately when I called, but could NOT pick up the phone anytime before that to call ME and let me know you wouldn’t be showing today? What – too complicated for you?”
The fact that I didn’t bother to protest and was little surprised demonstrates long experience, if not patience or understanding, with contractors: it just happens, and it happens so much and in such rapid, almost daily succession that we hardly notice it, and indeed come to expect it. Even plan for it at times.
“Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent. Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you.” –Carl Sandburg
We shrug our shoulders, work around it and think little or nothing of it for the most part, except for the most outrageous cases.
Truth be told, in the case of the kitchen guy I was so sure it would happen based on my past experience with contractors in general and this fellow in particular that I didn’t bother to notify the residents of the 2nd apartment scheduled to get cabinet work done on the same day. And, well, I was right.
“No problem, John,” says my current plumber’s office person each time I remind him yet again to give me a quick jingle if his plumbing crew is running late by an hour or more. He promises, and each time I believe this will be the time he keeps his promise. Each time he fails the simple test.
Today the plumber was 3 hours late when I finally called to reschedule. We made a new appointment for the next day between 10 and 11am. But not before I jokingly yanked his chain, chiding him for forgetting me so easily.
“There ought to be so many who are excellent, there are so few.” – Janet Erskine Stuart
Am I the only one who finds this to be tedious, mind-numbing and unacceptable behavior for professionals? Where’s the professionalism? The common courtesy? The consideration by one professional for another, for which your company would like to earn further work in the future?
Perhaps we tend to get so little respect when we frequently expect so little. Or possibly we come to expect such disrespect because we are so often treated with such slight care and little respect.
Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Life is like that. Sometimes you think you know something, then you don’t. Sometimes it’s all relative, and occasionally it’s all relatively silly.
