WARNING: This is a good old fashioned rant with TMI galore. Sorry in advance.
I hate confrontation. Hate. Hate. Hate.
I do whatever it takes to make it go away as painlessly as possible even if it means more work and inconvenience for me. I'd rather get a root canal than call someone out on the carpet.
Then today happened.
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I had three things going for me today to help me overcome my dread:
1. A bad case of PMS
2. An early morning phone call from one of Cami's friends informing her that she could no longer walk with Cami the half mile to the bus stop, leaving her to either walk by herself or have me accompany her. No advance warning. No explanation.
3. An inept football coach who has been calling me twice a week to scold me for spending too much money on the spaghetti dinner and insisting, despite my repeated heated protests, that he would find a way to get me the rest of the money at great inconvenience to himself. No gratitude has even once been expressed and no matter that I'd told him no less than 8-10 times to consider it our gift to the football team and that I had no desire to be further reimbursed, he just couldn't seem to let it go. (NOTE: It was not with selfless magnanimity that I refused the money, but with an ever increasing desperation to make him stop rubbing my face in it.) Finally, yesterday Spencer informed me that the coach was selling drinks to the boys after practice telling them that it was so they could pay me back. OUCH! The guilt he kept heaping on me was bad enough, but embarrassing me in front of all the boys ?! Double OUCH!
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I'm not sure that any one of these cases by themselves would have driven me to confront my fear of confrontation head-on, but today I couldn't seem to stop myself. I sent two long and somewhat bold emails outlining exactly how inconsiderate/stupid they were being (in a mostly nice way of course) and exactly what they needed to do to make things right again.
Thankfully the whole thing with Cami's friend turned out to be a big misunderstanding and was easily remedied with a quick chat on the phone. Cami still has a bus stop partner and it's all good.
Football coach ineptitude though is another story. So I went to pick up Spencer from football tonight and was immediately handed the proceeds of the coach's drink fundraiser (about $70). Livid that once again he had completely disregarded my own wishes and continued to make me feel like I'd inconvenienced him more than I'd helped, I went and found the coach still on the field. After handing the money back to him I told him that if he ever mentioned the money issue ever again that I would quit my job as meal coordinator on the spot and that he could start cooking all the pre-game meals himself. I then went on to tell him although I understood his desire to make sure that parents were being fairly compensated for the meals they provided, that it was a complete insult to my intelligence to repeatedly bring it up (without ever once expressing gratitude) despite our clear wishes to let it go.
Guess what? It's all good now too (and I didn't even cry). It's resolved. He's happy. I'm happy, even though I still think he's an insensitive, over-bearing, ungrateful jerk, but at least now he has an inkling of the fact too.
12 comments:
Wow! Good for you. I am still in awe of the whole feeding the football team experience, and to find out that you didn't accept the money? You are amazing.
And now we know "the rest of the story"!
Proud of you for so boldly standing up to the jerk football coach and "putting him in his place" (hopefully in front of his colleagues).
Nothing more beautiful than an angry assertive woman standing up for her rights.
Good job Lara.
Love, Dad-Mom
P.S. Glad it worked out with Cami's bus companion.
I am so glad you got to give the coach an earful! I hope he learns to occasionally say he's grateful for the incredible amount of work you put into planning, making, and/or oraganizing the meals every week.
Mirien, I wish I could claim to be selfless as to not accept any reimbursement at all ( but I still have a wad of one dollar bills in my purse to show for that), I just didn't want the extra $70 that he felt the need to keep rubbing in my face.
Good for you Lara! I know how hard that can be!!
If you do end up quitting as football meal coordinator, can you become MY meal coordinator instead? There would be absolutely no monetary reimbursement, but the thank yous would be abundant! =)
(By the way, way to go on standing up for yourself!)
Great job, especially with the no crying part. That's always my downfall.
Way to go. Good job on standing up for yourself, especially to the coach. Whenever I have to something like that, my face goes red and my bottom lip trembles. Isn't that weird? No tears, yea!
You go girl! I'm taking mental notes of what to do when Allen plays football.
Good job Lara! That is not easy, I can't believe he is so ungrateful.
Good for you! I would have for sure been crying to hard to speak. Having just made dinner for the teachers and staff at our elementary school, I understand how the lack of gratitude would make you MAD. Jerk football coach.
I am glad you stood up for yourself. Sometimes it is the only way to let people know that they have crossed the line!
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