Tuesday, July 24, 2007

Self Central

Today has already been a good day, but it's bound to get worse. I was driving in today and had the urge to listen to "Bird In The Hand" by Ice C.ube. I came in ready for whatever is thrown at me. "...punch the clock like a slave and be happy when YT says there's no room for the African..." I'll take my hip hop over your hip hop anyday. Fuck dancing, I'm stompin'.

My boss has a meeting fetish. I've got two with him today. He'll come into a standing meeting he sets, and say "Well I have nothing on my agenda. Does anyone have anything to talk about?" Now, if this had happened at my old job, we'd walk out and the meeting would be over. But here, this gives staff the opportunity to blather on about WHATEVER comes to mind. I mean it turns into the TMI express. I can't believe some of the shit they bring up in a management staff meeting. "We had to go to the ER this weekend. My son stuck a marble up his ass." Really, Angie?

It's all part of my overriding belief that most people don't even think about other people. It's a pervasive narcissism that's taking over our society. We are the "Me" generation, now and forever, until something major happens to change it. Personally, I think that I might take other people into consideration too much.

I've been in this extremely guilty mindset for the last couple of days. This chick I've been cool since '91 has started hanging out with my ex-wife. She emailed me about it and I was bugged. I couldn't put my finger on it, but then I realized what upset me: it's lingering guilt over me not trying harder to make my marriage work. I don't know if I'll carry that baggage into the next relationship(s) I enter into. It's the one thing that I tried that I truly failed at. I just didn't want anybody I was cool with to see her side of my shortcomings. I've tried not giving a fuck, to no avail.

We all fail in some aspects of our lives, it's just tough for it to be so public. It's a pride thing, I guess. I might be one of the last holdouts on keeping that private.

Be Good,
KZ

15 comments:

1969 said...

Zed...I feel ya. I try to keep my failures under wraps too. I know it's hard to believe when you're a blogger....but I am a fairly private person.

I hate admitting defeat and I hate to be judged by it.

You're human. You tried, it didn't work. It's all water under the bridge now. A real friend won't judge you.

Gemini Girl aka GG said...

wow this is so me but yesterday...as I get older I'm finding I can't please everyone and more than that I don't want to ... it is all about "me" and my family I'm in survival mode because you know what? people don't care about you, they want to control how you are with them..and the more and more I push these people out of my life the more and more they get pissed at me for having my OWN life and taking control of it...and it makes me feel guilty for hurting people that want me to be something else and it makes me feel guilty that I can't be what they want me to be..I wish I could not care so much but I'm human ...its hard Zedman...but somehow we keep going..once emotions come into play nothing is private

Anonymous said...

I have way too many shortcomings and fail at everything...so I don't even try to hide them anymore.
Doesn't help that I come with a disclaimer...something about being an ass and having ass-ish ways.
Bad thing about that is...I don't care what ppl think...when I probably should.

Miz JJ said...

I feel you about this "me" generation thing. I have a chalkboard in my apartment and the current quote of the month is "Only I can prevent narcissism". Heh.

I suppose as a human being we are going to fail. I figure anyone who has not failed at something is just lying.

Little Brown Girl said...

That was very honest Zed and most men wouldn't own up to it...hell most women either. I know I sometimes worry about how my ex portrays me to other people. Well actually I use to but I don't now because at the end of the day I know who I am and what I gave to the relationship...I also know what I didnt give and as a result the next cat will benefit from the knowledge I now have of my shortcomings. I look to the future cause I can't change or control how the past is told.

We lie when we say we don't care what others think cause if we didn't (even if just a little bit) we wouldn't be human. Saying we don't care is our way of hiding from ourselves and being vulnerable to the opinions of others. Nobody likes knowing people think they are fuggin crazy so the best way to avoid having to look into the face of others opinions is to merely say we don't give a fugg what they think. You were honest...I admire that about you!

proacTiff said...

Imagine how schools are run. On fugging meeting fuel. I abhor meetings. Don't we have classrooms to run instead of mouths?

onefromphilly said...

Failure is just not an option with me. But I truthfully failed at this marriage thing too. But at the end of the day I can sleep at night, because I know I did my absolute best. And that's all I got!

Did you give your best to your marriage? If so then you can't worry about what others think. The only people who really know what happened in that marriage are your ex and you.

A.u.n.t. Jackie said...

you know i've avoided marriage thus far like the plague, for no other reason than on some level i didn't want to fail.

i now realize that it's my type a personality that leads me to believe that my relationship success or failures are not personal failures...

somehow knowing you and you didn't fail, you simply didn't do what many do which is remain in a marriage that FELT like a failure!

ChezNiki said...

Have nothing to say about marriage or failure... Ive never been married and Ive f*cked up so much in the past ten years, I can only go up from here...

However, I do think the only time you truly fail is when you dont try.

I went home this weekend for my birthday. My sister had a sign on her door that says:

"It will all be alright in the end. If its not alright, Its not the end."

Luving your Avatar! Zed Simpson...

EqualOpportunityCrush said...

it's good that you're able to self-reflect and acknowledge that you even have short-comings.. most people can't...

but, i am curious, do you feel like you didn't try your best/ hardest in your marriage? if so, why not? just curious.. you don't have to answer

Angel said...

i feel the same way about people! but i get called cynical and pessimistic when i say it... :-(

Knockout Zed said...

I'm a slacker! I haven't responded to anyone. Here goes:

@Sixy
I can't shake it. Especially when I run into people who think I'm still married.

@GG
You have said the key sentence. PEOPLE DON'T CARE ABOUT YOU, THEY WANT TO CONTROL HOW YOU ARE WITH THEM. That's it in a nutshell. A lot of people don't buy the cynical outlook, but I've found that to be true as fuck.

@Know u
If you can get by not caring, I say more power to you. If I said I didn't care, I'd be lying. For real.

@Miz JJ
That's a damn funny quote.

I don't mind failure (actually that's a lie), I just don't like public failure. Failure on display is sad.

@RD
My ex had a gang of issues. I have a gang of issues. They didn't mesh or co-exist. Everybody brings issues, the success or failure depends on how those things interact. Ours didn't work. The one thing I know about her that will not change is her tendency to portray herself as a victim, regardless of the situation. I know she's not having moments like the one I had. She doesn't doubt for a minute that I "wronged" her, and that's that.

Yeah, I care how I look. I wish I didn't.

@Pro
Meetings are the perfect storm of the boring and the verbose. It's a cornucopia of waste. Strangulation is illegal? *sigh*

@OneFrom
I absolutely did not give my best to my marriage. I believe I wasn't being given the best, so I stopped trying. Pretty early on, too.

@AJ
That's another way to look at it. I'm a quitter not a failure. LOL

@Chezniki
First of all, Happy Belated, mama. I hope you behaved yourself!

Second, that's an excellent quote. I love it! I'm not sure if I believe it, but I love it nonetheless.

@EOC
I didn't try because I felt like she was trying to sandbag me from the beginning. It's hard to explain without putting it all out on the table, but she started us off on a lie and it went downhill after that.

@FA
You are cynical and pessimistic. It doesn't mean you aren't right! LOL

KZ

Anonymous said...

Ah...maybe I do care what ppl think. After all, I wouldn't be human if I didn't, as RD put it.

I think it's more about not caring about miscellaneous peoples opinion of me. If your not my family or my close knit of friends...no, I don't care. Even then, depending on the topic I may not care about their opinion either. I can not and do not set out to please everyone.
You can only be you, if ppl don't get it, then they just don't get it.
Should I change so that I am not view as narccistic? Probably, but being me...works for me...

Divorce means failure?

ChezNiki said...

@Know U- Saying! Divorce is not always failure. Sometimes it can be the most humane thing to do under the circumstances.

@ZedSimpson- I didnt get to misbehave until I got back up here. Now that my Blogger is all operational and sh*t, you can read all about it

You should believe it, it mayve been the end for THAT marriage but just the beginning for you and your next successful one.

You all in love and worried. So cute ((pinching cheek)). POST YOUR HAIRCUT ALREADY!

>>Smootches<<

YouToldHarpoTaBeatMe said...

"I don't know if I'll carry that baggage into the next relationship(s) I enter into. It's the one thing that I tried that I truly failed at."

Wow Zed! You're like the SECOND man I've ever heard say that. He's living in the 'zoo' too. Go figure. Maybe it's in y'alls water supply.

Let one of my friends start hanging with my ex-hubby. I'm silly enough to say something like "Oh and anotha thing, tell that Pirate Negro I want all'muh'dayum CDs back"! I have plenty of shortcomings, but none of them would matter, the moment the ex starts popping off at the mouth.

We have a conference nazi too. Especially on Fridays, like nothing was hot Mon-Thur, but NOW. Whatever he passes is usually something that I and other Senior Enlisted have passed.