I think I like him

I saw him at my desk today. This IT dude walks over to my desk to ask for my assistance. He walks in my cubicle space and says, "I have a need." My heart stops for a second, and I'm sure my face betrayed me having devilish thoughts of fulfilling his need. He says with his easy smile, "It's not that kind of need!" Oh how I wish it were. (I'm so digging it that I had to blog about this immejetly [way beyond immediately].)

I don't know what it is about this dude, but he is so yummy to me. He's smart, funny, quite cute, and just an overall cool dude. He's also a white guy, but that doesn't matter to me. A hot guy is a hot guy. I wonder if I look up at him with lovestruck eyes. I wonder if I told him how hot he is if he would return that same look. I get all warm and fuzzy inside when I'm near him, and I wish I could be close to him a lot.

This all sounds so elementary, but I really dig him. How bold am I to act on it? That I'm not sure of yet, but I'd have to pull him off to the side when it became too much to hold in my heart.

I did that once before in college with this light-skinned pretty-eyed teddy bear of an upperclassmen. I was still a freshman who had not found her inner woman yet. He must have been a junior getting focused on getting out of school and into the real world. Teddy was so adorable, sweet, and just cool. I like my mean meaty, and I surely liked him. Definitely had meat on the bones but not too much. Sometimes, he and I sat at the same huge table to eat dinner with others. Sometimes, I just saw him in the dorm lobby hanging out, and we were always cool.

Teddy had been making my heart skip several beats for a while, and I just couldn't hold back. We were walking back through the residential area through the trees and sidewalk one evening as we did two or three times a week. Fall leaves showed their beautiful colors as they blew in the breeze. They appeared to be shaking like fragile brown, yellow, and orange pom-poms cheering me on and giving me a little hope. I sucked it up, held my breath for a minute, and when I needed air, I blurted out, "I have a confession."

Teddy slowed down and looked at me with some concern. "Speak your mind."

I swallowed hard and finally said, "I like you. I think you're such a nice guy, and you're cute. I just had to let you know that I really like you."

Teddy batted his long lashes behind his glasses, and a smile crept across his warm face. Thanks to his light complexion, I could see a slight blush forming. Maybe he likes me back. Maybe his heart flipped a few times just as mine had done.

Teddy continued smiling as he found the right words: "I'm flattered that you think of me that way."

Oooh.... I had heard that before from my first love, who I was still cool with and was determined to marry after college. (Thank GOD that didn't happen!) Flattery will get you everywhere - except into the flattered person's heart.

"I see you as a friend. I think we'll be better as friends. Besides, I'm seeing someone."

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I still don't know if any of that was true because he and I didn't talk as much in my sophomore year. Maybe he really got serious in his senior year. Plus, I did switch to a dorm in the middle of campus with stairs upon stairs but no elevators. Only your real friends visit you when you live in a dorm where you have to take 3 flights of stairs.

His rejection didn't hurt me, but it doesn't make me itch to tell someone else how crazy I am about him. So I honestly don't know if my colleague will ever know how much my heart flip flops for him. *sigh*

I've had a blogging block (not break) for a pretty good reason. See...I find myself caught up in trying to create a blog that's noteworthy or at least a favorite for a few people. Most importantly, I like being able to express myself about myself. Not that I'm a self-absorbed narcissist that spends all of my time in the mirror worrying about me!me!ME! I really do have other thoughts on my mind about the world today. But I struggle with expressing thoughts about ME knowing that there are so many important and critical things going on in the world.

• It's a damn shame that Mychal Bell was freed from jail only to be put back in again. It's like the judge is telling all Americans, "Oh! Y'all think y'all did something coming down to Jena and marching? Let me show you that y'all ain't did s***!" (Initially, my true intentions were to get involved in the Jena 6 movement by blogging about the latest happenings. But then things would get crazy at work, and I didn't get the opportunity to blog when the news was fresh. C'est la vie.)


• Nooses keep magically appearing on college campuses, but these incidents aren't limited to just the South. Who knew there were rednecks at Columbia Univeristy?


• Georgia is having a serious drought even in October. It's as if God said, "I'm tired of y'all building over the glorious land I provided. So why should I give moisture to what you're going to reconstruct anyway?" According to an interview on V-103 earlirer this week with Mayor Shirley Franklin, Atlanta may soon have to deal with water the same way Las Vegas does.

Now, I am a conservationist and psuedo environmentalist by nature. I am who I am. I really do believe that turning off my shower water for about 2 - 3 minutes while washing my body can make a small difference. The suds and dirt being washed off can be delayed. It's not like the dirt's going to seep back into my skin for another day.

But at the same time I know that I feel I can contribute to saving the earth, I had to realize that I'm not a civil rights activist. It's easy to recognize that we still have so far to overcome with all the injustice that we're suffering. But I'm not a political pundit. I'm not trying to be one of the new civil rights figures. I'll be glad to help out, but I don't know if I'm supposed to step up to be "The Voice" of the movement. I want to do more, but it's almost seems impossible to want to take life so nonchalant when there's global warming, an endless and reasonless war in Iraq, and this insane housing bubble.

Honestly, I'm just trying to be me. Just regular ol' not all that deep me. At the same time, I want to grow into a deeper, more introspective person. Maybe all of the growth and evolution will be obvious in my blogging and my overall self-awareness. Actually, I'm quite aware right now because being 30 is the greatest! I know more about who I am and who I want to be. I'm just having difficulty accepting that I want to be "deep" so that my blogging can be "deep".

For now, I'm just not deep. So, I just have to accept that I'm not one of those deep philosophical types. I can't dig deep to impress upon people about how much trouble African-Americans are in and will be in if things don't change for us. I'm not the one to spit all these historical facts about our history and where we've been so we'll know where we're going.

I just wanna be me while I'm blogging. I'm accepting that. As long as your readers accept it, I'm good. If readers don't, then there's other blogs, aren't there?

Co-workers can be funny as all get out. Not hold your sides and slap your neighbor's knee from laughing so hard funny. More like "Damn, you got issues" funny. The sad thing about this moment is I couldn't make this stuff up even though I'm an aspiring author. Maybe this comical but sad moment was given to me so I could experience something beyond my behavior standards. Something I can't imagine doing so I had to have it happen to put it in my mind.

It all started bright and early on a Wednesday morning. Traffic wasn't so bad, so it really took about 55 minutes to get to the job. I log into the phone first, so I'm the first one to get a phone call. I gently hit the button to open the lines of communication between customer and service associate. "Good Morning! Thank you for calling ____. This is Sunshyne. How may I help you?" Click.

Thank goodness for Caller ID because I got to look up the telephone number. No, I wouldn't call back and harrass a customer, but I had a sneaking suspicion of who was on the other line when the phone rang back immediately for my other coworker to learn that the third associate would be absent. It was that fake b**** of a coworker that I've posted about before (http://sunshynelyfe.blogspot.com/2007/05/being-pressed-must-be-pressing.html). I couldn't believe it because you can just ignore your coworker and ask for the manager's voicemail. Hanging up is middle school behavior, so I knew a 40+ year old woman couldn't do that.

But I just had to confirm it was that b****'s cell phone number, and I had to call her out. She probably didn't think anything of it, but hanging up on someone is so disrespectful. I sent a text message confronting her, and she simply replied, "I didn't want to talk to you." What? That pissed me off further because there was no remorse because she obviously felt I didn't deserve her respect. I can just have a dialtone with no apology or consideration for professionalism. There was no way I could just let that go. I'll admit my behavior was beginning to lean towards high school like drama, but I couldn't just let it go as if I was someone who could be easily disrespected. We have to work together, and the least colleagues can do is be civil to one another since they spend about 35 hours together.

So, I sent another simple text message: "So your solution was to hang up on me? Trust that you're not my fave person but I've never hung up on you when I was forced to talk to you and your attitude-filled hmmphs. Feel better."

Fast forward to Thursday morning. The phone rings to my colleague, whose cubicle is mine. I used those elementary lessons in context clues to figure out that the b**** was calling out again. Cool by me. It would be another cool day without her despite the work being so heavy because we do need all parties present. After b**** hangs up with my colleague, my phone rings 10 seconds later. I can't help noticing that the number is local, and I shake my head as I press the button on the ear piece.

"Good Morning! Thank you for calling ____. This is Sunshyne. How may I help you?"

A deep and obviously ill voice says, "Good Morning, Sunshyne! How are you?"

I routinely reply, "I'm fine. Thank you for asking. How are you?"

That ill voice forces out a pleasant, "I'm well this morning! Thank you!" Click.

I'm stunned that a 40+ year old woman really took time out on her sick day to call my line directly just to hang up on me. It angered me, but laughter escaped from my lips about 5 seconds later. I've never seen someone be so pressed about another individual, especially someone that should have more maturity. But that's the key. SHOULD. Having years under your belt doesn't give you wisdom under your dome.

That exchange did release a little of my inner evil though. I actually researched the phone number and confirmed that it matched the area where she said she lives. So I conveniently sent b**** a text message to follow up her display: "I hope you're resting well over on [street name], but I'm glad to know I'm on your mind on your day off." I know good and well hell I never think about the job on any day off. For what? My focus should be on me and enjoying myself or getting good treatment for whatever ails me.

So was there a lesson learned? Yes, there were two:

• I was tired of ignoring bullisht that I would encounter with that b****. I was trying to keep the peace because we have to work together. Getting hung up on (which essentially equate to "F*** you" in my mind) flipped the script. So, it's out there. I really don't care for her, and I'll just be a professional as possible. Anything personal or sociable is out the window.
• Truck driving is even more appealing than ever. I can't wait to get away from silly office politics and just drive. How much longer do I have? That depends on some of the research I'll get back. Maybe...just maybe I can find a truck driving school with night hours. Then I can keep my current job and benefits a little longer. Foolishness will not get in the way of my sound thinking.