Disappearing act: the art of letting go, walking away, not looking back, and moving on

I’m hopelessly passive aggressive. I have this habit of letting annoying things pass, just taking a deep, deep breath and ignoring all these little irritations, until such a time all the pent up emotions just completely overwhelm me like some evil spirit and erupt, sometimes even at the slightest provocation, and I snap in a very telenovela way, exploding like a furious, over-dramatic volcano that just woke up from centuries of cold dormancy. Imagine the very timid Dr. Bruce Banner losing his temper, tearing his clothes off, and transforming into a very mad, very green Incredible Hulk. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t lose my temper that easily. I’m very patient and non-confrontational, sometimes even to the point of selfless sacrifice and martyrdom. Pardon the histrionics. It takes a long, long time before something gets to me and irks me so bad I end up throwing and smashing things.

But if and when that happens, there is simply no turning back. Some bridges are burned, some bonds and ties (and I sometimes imagine body parts too) are cut off, and some feelings (mostly mine) are hurt. Apologies are not made. Not by me, at least. I see no reason in apologizing for something you intentionally do. I do not know how to explain it. Anger is a strong wind that blows out the lamp of the mind, a short period of utter lunacy where one simply loses control. I think British poet Francis Quarles describes it very well, my passive aggressiveness. He says to “beware of him that is slow to anger; for when it is long coming, it is the stronger when it comes, and the longer kept. Abused patience turns to fury.” That is exactly how I feel.

You see, after a bad (and quite possibly my last) day at work last week, I just had to get away. I have not reported to work in two days, and probably will not ever again. I have avoided contact with anything remotely related to my work. I just had to disappear. In the past three weeks or so I had been working on graveyard shifts, something that is already a challenge in itself. The company had decided that the dayshift we had been on for the past year was not working, and the best way to keep operations reasonably affordable was to have everyone working all together on one shift. And yet that did not bother me as much as I thought it would. I did not allow it to. I was even willing to explore the positive side of working at night, no matter how difficult it is to find that side with the sleepiness messing around with my senses. I stayed at the office after the shift that day, sleeping on a seldom cleaned couch. It was payday and I, together with the three other senior agents I worked with, was waiting for the salaries to be released. I didn’t mind having to miss a few precious hours of sleeping in the comforts of my own damp bed just to have my salary as soon as I could. There were clothes waiting to be bought.

And then they woke me up, telling me the paychecks had arrived. Finally, I thought to myself, and I happily walked into the HR office even before waking up completely. I was surprised at how small my salary was. Maybe it was just because I had just woken up, but I lost my temper. After receiving a paycheck so small I just felt so feverishly frustrated. I was so insulted and appalled. To me, the company made it clear I was no longer of value to them, giving me that check. It was half of what I was expecting to get that day, and I was just so offended receiving a salary that had been reduced to close to nothing by surprising deductions I didn’t even care to know about anymore. I may have been top agent several times, but I still have my two feet firmly planted on the ground. I wasn’t asking for too much, I just wanted what I worked for and what I deserved. Nothing more, nothing less. And yet they did not give that to me. Being the promising theatrical actor that I am, I slammed my fists on the table, I slammed the door, I cried, I laughed, I walked out, I walked back in to get my check, and I walked out again. I just lost it.

This is exactly what happened with my first job at an inbound call center years ago. I stretched my patience and tried to tolerate everything, every little mistake and evidence of neglect, for as long as I could. But there really comes a time when you know have had enough. I know it will probably be another decision that I will come to regret. But right now, no matter how I try, I can’t bring myself to decide otherwise. It may sound petty, but it was just one of the many things the company had done to show me how little I was appreciated, how much they had taken me for granted. And it was the last. It was the last straw. I may have allowed things like that to happen before, but I have had enough. And when I’ve had enough of something, I let it go, walk away, don’t look back, and move on. Every moment spent looking back into the past is a wasted opportunity to step forward and move on into the future. So I’m not looking back. The future is waiting for me.

I felt like a battered wife divorcing herself out of an abusive marriage. It hurts, but it had to end. It was my emancipation from cruelty. It doesn’t even matter if my estranged husband already finds himself another wife by now. I’m sure the company has found a qualified substitute. They might not admit it, but we all know I am irreplaceable. They will never find another me. Someone like me, maybe, but never another me. They might even get someone better. But not another me. If only they had not neglected me and pushed me too far. Sadly there really are times in life where you have to get abandoned by an employee for you to realize how valuable that person was. We realize to change for the better just when things get worse. We realize to correct our mistakes just when those mistakes have already done irreversible damage. And we finally decide to prove ourselves worthy just when the person to whom we want to prove our worth has already decided that we are not worth it at all, walks away, doesn’t look back, and moves on.

Oh well. I’m sure the company has learned its lesson now that I’ve given them a much-needed wake-up call. And I’m sure all the other employees will reap the benefits of what I have just sown. As for me, I’ll be moving on. Happily.