Thursday, November 4, 2010

Tuesday Was Craptastic!

Oh, my goodness, Tuesday morning was beyond terrible.  The worst was in the morning, but really, it cast a dark cloud over the whole day. 

Normally I have Tuesdays off, but my coworker, M, wanted to take a class for enrichment.  I'm a fan of learning, so I agreed.  No big deal, right?  WRONG!

I showed up to the building with a few minutes to spare.  Or what I thought was the right building, but turns out it was the other medical center, a block away.  Still, I had time so I hurried over there.  Then I got to the room that they sent me in an email, sat down, and was informed that I was in the wrong class.  I had only written down the room number and not the title of the course, so I had to wander around the building and finally ask someone.  Turns out the class was in 110, not 120.  K, minor setback, but totally fine because I was only 2 minutes late and class hadn't started yet.

Then the real fun began.  The instructor wanted us to do these long introductions, answering about 5 questions.  I could easily see that this class was definitely for enrichment and didn't apply so much to our jobs, so I let my coworker introduce herself first (Side note: I hate introductions because I hate speaking in front of groups, but I especially hate them when they're long and we aren't going to see anyone again after so who the fuck cares where everyone works?).  I thought that I would piggyback on M's explanation, since we do the same thing and I didn't want to repeat her.  Despite my hatred for intro exercises, I actually wasn't trying to get out of talking.  I just wasn't sure exactly how to answer all the questions and also didn't want to say exactly what my M said.

So when the instructor called on me, I started with, "I work with M and so I'm not going to repeat what she said," and then the instructor interrupted me, called out that I was "cheating" and then said some other stuff that I didn't hear because the whole class was laughing.  LAUGHING.  AT ME.  An introvert's nightmare!  Of course I turned fire-engine red.  It was so bad that I had to bury my face in my hands.  I was sweating like crazy.  I couldn't believe how she had picked on me, first thing in the morning, on my day off, after I had gotten lost, and made me almost want to cry.  If my coworker hadn't been there I would have left and not come back. 

I'm sure she doesn't think it was that bad.  She seems like one of those extroverts who can't possibly imagine what it feels like to be an introvert, and can't fathom anyone not liking to introduce themselves in front of a bunch of strangers.  But I couldn't concentrate for the first hour of class, and I don't want to go back for the second part.  It stuck with me through the rest of the day, and I got upset every time I thought about it.  I'm not sure what to do, though.  I want to tell her, or her supervisor, but at the same time I'm worried that she'll think I'm overreacting.  What would you do?

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