Tuesday, November 9, 2010

"Man who waits for roast duck to fly into mouth must wait very, very long time." - Unknown

For all of you regular readers, you know that I generally put some sort of quote that relates to how I'm feeling in my blog.  Today's quote has nothing to do with how I'm feeling - or so I thought....

My first thought was "Yeah, every wife could say this to their husband at some point!"  But then I did this weird thing...I started looking at the "deeper meaning" behind this Confucious-esque quotation.  And I think...I think that what it might actually be telling me is "Shelley, if you want something done, get off your ass and do it, no one else is going to do it for you!"

I have a vein in my forehead.  This isn't like any other vein in my body.  This vein will actually "pop out" of my forehead when I'm pushed far enough.  Generally this frustration has built up over time while I have been waiting for someone else to get something done.  "Can you take a look at this document and provide me with revisions, please?"  "Can you take out the garbage, please?"  "Are you able to...."  and I wait.

My husband was actually very good at this game.  He would wait until he saw the vein start throbbing before he would do something I asked of him.  Then, right before it was about to blow, he would get up and get started on whatever was required of him.  (The solution to this of course is to actually let the vein pop out and unleash a holy terror of expletives and feelings of under-appreciation - I completely recommend this avenue to anyone)

Let me be honest though, I don't typically ask a lot of people.  I am a firm believer that if I think that I am going to do it better than someone else, don't ask them to do it.  There is nothing more cruel that you can do to someone then ask them to do something and the redo it after they've done it.  It does nothing to build trust or self esteem in any relationship - and since I generally have a good idea in my head of what I want done, I don't ask for someone else to do it for me.

The flip side of that, however, is that I am ridiculously accommodating, if someone asks me to do something, I'll do whatever I can.  Even when I tell someone I don't have the time or resources to lend to a project, if they come back to me and word it even just a little bit different, I'm likely to find time in my schedule to accommodate the request.  Even if it makes my vein pop out. 

The problem with this, is that I have sort of created my own monster.  People have come to rely on me, in fact they rely on me to the point where I feel taken advantage of.  Perhaps they know they are taking advantage or perhaps they don't know. 

What I do know is that I am more than willing to roast my own duck.  The question is...are you?