The Bowl

April 10, 2021 – I am now sharing space with a colleague from another department. There was a restructuring, she was moved into my work area because it had an empty cubicle.

My colleague, let’s call her Ella, was not happy about this move. She was told a month prior that she would be moving. She called me, bawling her eyes out, saying, “Have you heard? It’s just awful!” I immediately thought somebody had died or something tragic had happened.

“What happened?”

“I’m moving up to your office. I’m losing my office and I have to move up there with you!” and she started crying. So many thoughts rushed through my head; not the least of which was “Am I so bad of a person that you are crying because you have to sit near me?”

Ella told me that she didn’t want to move up here. Her only solution was to quit her job. I asked her if she had a new job to go to or if she had money in the bank because quitting her job would not allow her to collect EI. The response, between sobs, was “No.” I told her she had no other choice but to accept it and find some positives; such as we have bright windows, a lovely view, it’s much more peaceful on my floor and she really might enjoy it. She continued to sob and then hung up.

She moved in on Tuesday. She came back from lunch and proudly announced that she had picked up a few things from the dollar store; namely a dish rack and new scrubbing brush. I told her that we had a dishwasher. She explained that she didn’t know how to use the dishwasher so she did her dishes by hand. I told her that she didn’t need to know how to use the dishwasher because I ran it every week. All she had to do was put her dirty dishes in it. She declined, saying that she preferred to hand wash her dishes. Okay. I can’t force her to use it.

Fast forward to yesterday. Ella walked into our office and asked if I knew why one of the bosses hadn’t taken her bowl after it had been washed for her. I said I didn’t know. Ella said, “But I washed it for her. She should have taken it back to her office.”

“Well, it’s not her bowl per se. It’s a bowl she likes to use. She leaves it in the sink when it’s dirty. I put it in the dishwasher because the cleaners don’t touch the dishes. When it’s clean it goes in the cupboard, when it’s dirty it’s in the dishwasher.”

“But it’s her bowl. I saw her using it. I washed it for her”

“No, it’s not her bowl. It’s a bowl that she prefers to use. But it’s not hers. It’s just a bowl. It’s not her bowl.”

Ella stared at me and tried to process what I had said. She sat at her desk and I heard sighing and huffing. She took out her anger and frustration by pounding on her keyboard as she messaged one of her friends.

I learned that Ella was not a good communicator and very passive aggressive. She didn’t talk to me for the rest of the day.

Today, after enduring a few monosyllabic responses, I asked Ella if something was wrong. She replied with a very quiet, “No.”

“Well you’ve been very quiet since yesterday afternoon. I wanted to make sure everything was okay.”

Ella spoke from behind her cubicle wall. “I am not talking to you. Every time I talk to you or ask you a question, you seem to get annoyed. So I don’t want to annoy you. So I am not talking to you.”

I had had enough. I got up and walked to her desk and sat in her guest chair. I said that we needed to talk. I explained that wasn’t how we did things in this office. I said that I was not annoyed with her but that if she felt I was responding that way then she should respectfully point it out to me and we could have a conversation.

Ella started talking about how unhappy she was that she had to give up her office. She started crying and said that I treated her like a renter. I wasn’t sure what that meant. I reminded her of the things I had done to make her feel welcome and that the truth was that I, as a contract employee, was more of a renter than she was. She then segued to the bowl discussion. She didn’t like that I told her where to put dirty and clean dishes. I explained that the bowl was just a bowl. It wasn’t the boss’s bowl. So she shouldn’t expect her to take the bowl back to her office when it was cleaned because it didn’t belong there – it belonged in the cupboard.

Ella seemed satisfied that she got to air her feelings and things went back to normal. Unfortunately now she won’t stop talking.