We’re on Day Three of the never-ending headache, and I’m starting to crave how it feels when the giant super triple mocha overload Advil slides down my throat.

After yet another meeting with yet another person, I think the story about my impending space exile goes like this:

• The Space Board *is* upset at me
• I am unreliable because I am late a lot
• This doesn’t necessarily apply to the other people who are 40-45 minutes late all the time, because they are reliable and easy to work with
• It doesn’t matter how brilliant I am; if I’m not easy to work with I’ll never get anywhere in this universe or any other
• This entire situation should not have been summed up as “our clients hate you”, because they don’t and I am technically awesome and super mad skilled
• However, I suck in almost every other aspect – late sometimes (unreliable), pushy (shoot my mouth off), believing people in power who tell me things to expect about my career (naive), bad days (emotional), get upset at ludicrous situations (difficult to work with), potential time bomb (too much chili for lunch)
• It doesn’t matter that I don’t take lunch breaks or leave the office during the day and work late and on weekends; I am not here at 9am and am therefore unreliable and less likely to ever be promoted over other people, especially those who are super nice, never question anything, and are not volatile in any way (say, like cottage cheese or 2% milk) even if they are late every day and take extended lunch breaks

It gets hard not to take things personally some times.

Here is a timeline for you:

Monday April 16th

3:15pm: Space Boss invites me into his office for a talk. He talks, I listen. The things I am told include I was a dislocated shoulder away from being fired because of customer complaints against me, I have been treating people badly who do not deserve it, everyone is unhappy with my work, I have a terrible attitude, and do not take my job seriously. I am numb and silent with shock. This is the first time anyone at work has ever mentioned a problem with me.

3:45pm: A co-worker asks me a question, and I burst into tears so she takes me into another office and I pour my heart out. I am confused and devastated not only by my almost-firing, but that people have complained about me and are unhappy with my work. I explain through my sobs that it is not the tech support I am so hateful of but the other things – not being a real boy, expecting people to come through on their promises and continually being disappointed, having projects taken away from me for no reason – that has soured my mood lately. I cry for an embarrassingly long time, using up a lot of Kleenex. My nose is Rudolph-red.

4:30pm: I receive two emails. One is a Letter of Understanding, addressed to me personally, and is a rehash of the conversation with the Space Boss. The rest of the Space Board is copied on the email, which includes things like “based on our conversation today I would like ask you to ask you to drop all your duties related to space station support (alien beings, airlocks, atmosphere controls, communicators, phasers set to stun or otherwise – basically everything). The reasons for that are that we are not happy with the support level provided and your attitude towards the work” and “I would like to receive a concise report after each day of work as to what has been done during this day” and also “for the next 30 days you will be on a trial period – both you and we can terminate our contract at any time. Please treat this letter as a warning – as much as I like you personally, we will not be able to work together unless you treat your job seriously”. The other email, which went to the entire space station, says “Kimli is no longer doing space station support” and raises far more questions than it answers.

4:45pm: I compose an email for my Space Boss, and copy the Space Board on it. It reads, in full:

I understand the Space Board is unhappy with me, but I really think it’s fair that I receive some indication as to why. In our meeting today, you mentioned that clients have complained about the level of service I’ve provided, and that I am treating people badly. When I asked for clarification, you said it wasn’t important – but since these complaints have directly affected my job, I am not unreasonable in wanting some more information. I do take pride in my work, and if I have offended someone inadvertently, I would like to know so I can ensure it does not happen again.

I do not think, under these circumstances, that it is fair or wise to simply state that I cannot do Space Station support any longer. I am extremely good at it, and the majority of our clients are very happy with my services – I can show you email after email from clients thanking me and telling me how great I was when dealing with their issue. As well, I think it would do a serious disservice to [our space station] to pull me off support in this manner. The workload is such that Bossk cannot handle it alone; Greedo is too busy, and Chirpa is in no way able or ready to answer any incoming questions.

I am more than capable of handling both support and working on Satellite 14b. I ask for some clarification as to what exactly I have done to cause these ramifications, and if applicable, share my side of whatever story there might be. You claim my attitude has been unacceptable, yet I have never once let it affect how I support our customers. Everyone has bad days, and yes, I have been guilty of letting some things get under my skin more than they should. However, I have been given no warning, no feedback, and no inkling of any kind of problem until our meeting today in which you mentioned I would have been fired if not for dislocating my shoulder. I ask that you let me know what sort of complaints have been said about me, so that I may work on whatever issues there might be and continue to help [our space station] keep clients by providing the same level of technical support that I receive many accolades for.

5:10pm: I go home and have a terrible, terrible night

Tuesday, April 17

10:00am: Space Boss invites me into his office again to discuss the email I sent. Many things are discussed; the only thing I take away from the conversation is that ALL the complaints are coming from HIM – not my clients, not my fellow astronauts, and not the Space Board. It’s all him. I am, I’m told, too angry all the time. My mood affects everyone else, and he cannot work when I am creating such a bad atmosphere. My chakras are misaligned, my aura is cloudy, and all complaints about my entire person are stemming from my boss who phrased it in such a way that made it sound like everyone I ever worked with or for is out for my head because of the horrible etiquette faux pas I have made.

Wait, I do take one other thing away: the quality of my work is not in question – no one has complained about me; everyone knows I am a technical mastermind; the clients who have told me I am awesome are not lying; why would I think otherwise?

12:30pm: Vice Space Boss calls. He is apologetic; confirming that the words did NOT come from the Space Board and that there is no great conspiracy against me. He apologizes for how everything went down, adding that his main concern is that I will leave because I am unhappy and leave a giant gaping hole and not that the perpetual cloud of stormy doom above my head is a big downer for “everyone”. We will talk again soon, and he hopes I am not ragingly angry at everyone because of what I was told they think of me and my mad skillz.

1:07pm: I have been debating if and how to share these new developments with the rest of my world, not finding the right words to describe everything going through my head. I decide to use a timeline because it is much easier than creating real paragraphs and any sort of story flow. I am flummoxed and very weary.

I did a lot of soul searching last night, in between crying jags and getting even more bad news over email. I thought a lot, exchanged ideas with Ed, ate some random things I found in the fridge, tasted Josh’s oil, and slept off the worst headache I’ve had in a long time brought on by stress, crying, and the universe trying to split my atoms with a karmic hammer. The conclusions I came to can all be boiled to one brief zen-like statement:

I am a bad person to have in a canoe.

That’s it. That is the end-all statement to explain why everything seems to go to hell for me very quickly after I’ve been lulled into a false sense of security. If it was just once, okay – bad luck for me. Twice? Well, times they are a-changin’ and things will be better soon. Three times? Four? The fifth time, staring me in the face and telling me I’m a stinky poopy head who is a big meanie to those far more delicate than I? Well, it’s hard not to take it personally and keep from lying awake at night wondering just what it is about me that makes people take such delight in ousting me in vicious, baffling ways.

I think I know why, though, and it all comes down to my being a very bad person to take white water rafting, or on the maiden voyage of an unsinkable ship, or on a scenic cruise around the harbour, or on a good old fashioned split pea soup portage:

I rock the boat.

I cannot keep myself from rocking the boat. I start rocking, people get upset, and I am forced out usually by being treated horribly. In my current situation, we traced the trouble back to mid-February – exactly when I started asking for our contracts to be renewed, pushing for Real Boy status, and asking when all the things that had been promised to us would be coming to fruition. Hmm. I rocked the boat at my last space station, too – asking for the raise I had been assured of, taking Space Boss Charlie’s word that I was being promoted, trying to ensure processes were logical and changing those that weren’t. I’m a boat rocker. I fight for fairness. I have an absurd sense of entitlement, usually stemming from the way I remember things being said or promised and expecting people to come through. I fight for others, too – I hate seeing fellow astronauts being treated badly so I’ll often rock the boat on their behalf. I’m a boat rocker. I boat rock out.

So, I’ve figured out the WHY. I don’t know what to do about it, though. Perhaps I will invest in a personal floatation device.

My Space Boss was about to fire me when I broke my arm. He didn’t, because he didn’t want to kick me while I was down. Apparently, my attitude has been bad and I’ve treated people badly when they didn’t deserve it (he wouldn’t tell me who or give me any examples) and the space bosses are generally unhappy with me for a large variety of reasons. The only reason I still have a job today is because I dislocated my shoulder. Huh. How about that.

I do believe I’ve left the yellow brick road entirely.

My grand plan of taking it easy yesterday backfired – this morning I am more sore than I was on Friday. I hemmed and hawed about going to work but ultimately decided I would be pretty useless so I didn’t go in. Then I felt really guilty about it, so I got up anyway and started working. A few dozen emails in, I looked at the clock and realized it was after ten am and I hadn’t heard from anyone – huh? No one is on MSN, my emails are going unanswered, and the four people I tried to call did not pick up. Just great. I take one header on my scooter and wind up in the ER, and the next thing I know the space station has imploded and everyone is dead.

I called a few more people before I finally woke up our lead astronaut and found out – today is a holiday. I mean, I know it’s Easter Monday, but on this side of the world we get Good Friday off and Easter Monday is a regular work day unless you’re crazy and in Quebec. I don’t think I’ve *ever* gotten Easter Monday off before, hence my confusion. Sure ‘nuff though, our space station is closed. Wacky! I think I’ll go back to bed and stop feeling guilty that I am not downtown, and glad that my fellow astronauts are not space zombies.