***
I should be working right now, but I'm not. I don't care if I get paid for doing nothing. I've done these several times, but there are worse people that would put my laziness to shame. I had a horrible morning last night. I wanted to cry and go home, sleep to get that day over with. It was partly my fault but I didn't regret doing it.
Since she was a close friend, I asked the HR employee handling payroll how my performance appraisal at work turned out. At this time, I was about 50-50 into believing that my promotion was going to push through. I was recommended last year, but it didn't happen because the big boss said it was the crisis and most of the promotions were deferred to save money, yada yada yada. Now, I'm a very patient and understanding guy and I didn't take this in too negatively. Don't get me wrong, I was definitely disappointed. But I knew some people had to make sacrifices, and I felt that the following year, I was getting that promotion for sure.
But then she told me, hey, you got an increase of __%. It was obviously lower than the increase I would get IF I had the promotion, and even though I thought I already set myself up for disappointment, it still jolted me.
I thought I'd give a little background. My ex-boss, who just recently left for another job a few months ago, did not even care to evaluate us before he left. He left it to the one next in line, someone who absolutely does not know the quality of my work and what I've done for this company. It's a freaking travesty.
So in the end, this is what happened. Another year of not getting a little appreciation. Another year of getting older and being left farther and farther behind by my peers. Another year of getting blindsided. Another year of not getting any respect. Another year of being led to believe that something good's going to happen and then getting smacked in the face with a subtle "eff you". There's no such thing as justice in this world. Yes, I said it. The world thrives on being unfair.
This morning, people from Pounding the Rock linked to an article by Dan Shaughnessy undermining the greatness of Tim Duncan. Kelly Dwyer and Joe Posnanski already showed masterfully how wrong that dude is, but still, I can't help but resonate to how some people treat my favorite basketball player ever (Yes, I went there... I dropped Michael Jordan like a hot potato).
Like every PtR'er, I worship Manu, too, but now that I think about it, I find more and more reasons why I love Tim Duncan the most. To make a long story short, I'm just a sucker for him being the epitome of a quiet superstar - he does everything on both ends on the floor, carries his team almost every night, wins, but doesn't celebrate in your face or disrespect the other team. Heck, Shaugnessy even calls Tim out on his extreme modesty as possibly one of the reasons why he's not a Top 10 player. Duncan is that humble. I can't help but applaud the man for that. And I can't help but almost cry for him, too, if people continuously use words like "boring" and "small-market player" to underrate where he ranks in the pantheon of not only the greatest NBA players, but athletes in general.
I, too, feel like a part of me is being disrespected whenever that happens. I may be exaggerating at this point, but I believe that Tim Duncan stands for a lot of what I want to be as a person. Sure, his max salary might say, hey, this guy's already being given what he's due. But it's not that simple. While I can go on and on and just repeat what the Duncan defenders are always saying, I won't. Because you know what? Tim Duncan doesn't give a shit at what you, me or other people say or think about him. Aside from basketball skills, I think that's Duncan's quality that I admire the most.
I work for the research arm of my company and we're probably the most unrecognized group in the building, despite doing a lot of things that help this institution make money or get the recognition it sorely lacks. Our room is even situated at the farthest end of the corridor, away from people's eyes and beside a prayer room that very few people go into. Not even a lot of people know the names or faces who work in this department. But if other employees don't know what to do with something, they dump it on research. Yeah, we'll handle that for you, even if you know you can handle it on your own but you're just too "busy" to do other more important things like having three-hour lunch breaks or complaining about the slow internet connection.
Come evaluation time, everyone's yapping about how they helped the company earn this much or that much or how their project was a success or how they had to deal with this or that problem. And here we are, in the sidelines, with still a lot of people not knowing what we actually do. It's a real shame. Like Tim Duncan, I know the feeling of being under-appreciated by the so-called experts. But unlike Tim Duncan, I deal with it rather poorly. Or at least I've reached a point where I couldn't take it anymore - I couldn't just sit here and allow myself to be slighted, disrespected, abused, used like a tool and treated like cheap labor.
I'm probably one of the most patient guys you'll ever meet but sadly, I'm still not at the level of Duncan's humility, steadfastness and indifference to those who choose to ignore what's really important. Yes, I will say that I'm freaking 5 or 10 times better than the people here who earn much more than I do. I knew these things for a few years and I chose to keep my Duncan face on, quietly going about my business, knowing my time will come. But really, do nice guys finish last? Or, as LatinD once commented on a post here, do nice guys finish... at all? I don't know.
I'm a person who believes and stands firm on the idea of values, so if the values I believe in are being compromised, I can't just let allow people to continuously step on them. Sure, I can forgive a few slights here and there. But now that they've shown how low they are willing to go to disrespect me, I think I've finally hit boiling point.
Despite sinking into new levels of sadness and disappointment, reading these recent stuff about Tim has somewhat given me hope to hold onto. Will the meek really inherit the earth? Again, do nice guys really finish, at all? Does social justice and life eventually balance out the world's imbalances? I'm not too sure, but looking at how Tim has lived his life, yeah... maybe they will happen at some point. I don't know exactly when, but like how The Big Fundamental lives, I will try to stop caring about how other people use me or think of me. I will start focusing on how to further improve myself, and it will probably begin with getting out of this damned company.
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