I was dismissed

Oh how I'd forgotten how mean nurses are. They're subhuman.

Am I so spoiled, working in software so long, that I expect people to have manners and respect for colleagues?

Today a strange nurse came up to me and said blah blah blah in my face, I understood nothing, but wanted to help, that's why I'm there. I said, "Sorry, I'm an intern." (They see how old I am and assume I'm a senior nurse, it sucks.)

She literally flipped her wrist in my face and said, "INTERN!" as she walked away.

Wow. Like you know, in the movies when the king is tired of being fed his grapes and waves the servant away, "Dismissed!"

I'm not humiliated, because I'm in too much shock at such bad behavior.

Then I experienced a weird situation where my boss, the lady who writes the schedule for the entire hospital (a job I'd done before, it sucks) came into our 1PM Scrum and started explaining the scheduling issues she was having.

But she used the formal language. With the nurses. Her colleagues. I remember J telling me the principal at his school uses formal language with everyone, and the people underneath her all use informal.

So, hospitals, and schools, have a caste system.

Cuz when I worked in software in Cologne, I said hello to the CEO every morning by his *first name* using the informal language.

I asked J about it just now and he explained that some people want to keep a professional distance.

It's just weird, as an American.

Then I remembered I did it myself once. I had an intense dislike of someone my own age, and I refused to use the informal language with him. I repeatedly used the formal to throw up a wall between us. Don't you get close to me. (Though it sounds like I was being rude, rather, I was showing respect in a way, despite the fact the dude kept using the informal with me.)

That is not considered rude, it's just a social nuance that exists in countries with two forms of the language.

Let it be a lesson to me. If someone is exceedingly useless to me (those kids in my medic class) - do NOTHING rather than express it somehow.

I do not have a thick skin as you know, and this gesture hurt me more than anything yet.


***

Taking the bus home with me today was Nils, my angry next door neighbor kid. (Whose yelling keeps us up at night.) I let him get far ahead of me on our walk home and saw my horse and donkey lift their heads as he walked by.

Then I walked by and not only did they raise their heads, they saw from my gait/aura that it was me, and they came to the fence and walked alongside me. That felt GOOD.

I said, "Hey, heeeyyyyy! Hi! Nice to see you!" and reached in my bag and gave them the piece of baguette I'd saved from my lunch for them.

I split it in half and gave each of them a piece.

But Mag's a wheat-bread snob and won't eat white. *lol*!!!

He dribbled it whole out of his mouth and it landed directly on Bellis' broad back.

Then he wondered if it was, in fact, tasty, and he nibbled it on her back a little.

This annoyed Bellis, "Don't eat on my back, I'm not your table!"

She moved away and he followed her, nibbling again when she stopped.

Somehow it stayed on her back as he nibbled and she whipped her head around angrily again, "I said I'm not your table!"

Finally it fell to the ground, cuz Mag really hates white bread, and she whirled around and ate it before he could change his mind.

Or put it back on her back again: )