It’s something I’ve been hearing a lot from people lately is how negative I am.  Can you really blame me?  These past 2 to 3 years have been complete shit.  Bankruptcy, Divorce, Heart Attacks, Surgeries, having to give up my Dog for my move/living situation (which I wouldn’t wish upon anyone to live where I do), Car Problems, Weight Issues, spending insane amounts of money on medicines, medical bills, fuel and more…  Then lets top this off with the amount of folks I deal with daily that are so self absorbed and rude.  Yes, this makes for Denver to want to vent when someone asks how I’m doing.  If I didn’t vent, I think I would explode.  Sure, I can be negative.  I can also be very positive.  It’s just funny how folks tend to only pay attention to my negative side and practically ignore my positive side.  Which in turn, kind of makes me negative because my positive side gets ignored.

How about noticing all the doors I hold open, the extra effort I go through such as to drive a person to the door so they don’t have to walk so far in the rain, snow or heat?  Then I go park the car, and walk in the rain, snow or heat myself to the door.  How about all the times I stood waiting, either to get from the parking lot to the sidewalk or from the sidewalk to the parking lot in the cold rain, snow or heat while cars no only drive by without looking, but completely ignore the stop signs posted by the crosswalks in their climate controlled cars.  Whatever happened to the pedestrian have the right of way?  It’s even funnier when I stop, and the person outside just looks at me like I’m doing something weird.  How about when I finally get tired of seeing dishes that I didn’t make just sit in the sink and I wash them?  How about all the free computer repair and maintenance I do?  Free website work?  Nearly nightly foot and back massages?  Being pretty much the person to do the majority of the yard work or laundry?

Sure I’ve never been in a position to give anyone or loan anyone money.  I’m not much good at home maintenance or car repairs.  It’s not like I wouldn’t if I could.  Does it make me a bad person just because I can’t?

It frustrates me to no end that my career choice has sunk from an appreciated job, to an expected form of slavery.  I remember back in the day walking people through opening their computer and replacing parts, or installing drivers or diagnosing a multitude of issues.  Now folks call me with an attitude right off the bat as if I somehow caused their issues, they refuse to give me pertinent information and expect me to perform miracles based on next to no relevant information at all.  When I do fix their issue, they basically shrug me off and hang up.  (I’m not alone in this either, I have been talking to many other techs who feel like I do.)  My favorites are the ones that when it’s determined the problem is on their end.  How irate they become and argue that it just isn’t possible.

How about those doors I go out of my way to hold open for strangers.  It’s amazing how many can’t say “thank you”.  I’ve even had some give me comments like, “I can do it myself.”.  What happened to courtesy?

When I go for walks, I have to step off the sidewalk when a group of people come the other way.  I do it to be nice.  That and I swear I’m the only person in the world I know who would actually fall single file in a group if I saw someone coming the other way so they can have some sidewalk too.

When I go to the grocery store, it never fails.  Someone has their cart on one side of the aisle, and their ass on the other.  Blocking the whole aisle.  If I say, “Excuse me.”, they sigh heavily as if I ruined their day.  If I say nothing, they ignore me.  Yeah, makes me want to just punch them in the face for being ignorant.  But instead, I be nice and go around the other way.

When I talk to other people.  They tell me their good things and bad things.  I listen and if I feel I can help, offer suggestions.  When I talk and of course, much of what is going on with my life is generally on the downside, I get told how negative I am.  Yet I when I tell them things I have planned or how I’m looking forward to doing something, I get a “that’s cool” and little more.  It’s almost as if they could care less.  Granted, my good friends and family who care and they talk to me no matter what.  I’m thankful for that.  I can’t help that most of the things in my life are bad right now.  However, if you listen carefully I have good things to say too.