i get tired. i am an inherently nice person. oh, sure, beneath the surface, there is this black, black heart that is me – the woodlands biotch. but on the surface, there is me, the day-to-day, public persona that says “please” and “thank you” and holds doors and will drop what i’m doing to work on your problem. and it is this disconnect; this surface/beneath the surface that is going to do me in. i give you this example:
as an aside to what i do at work, and what i do online, and what i do in my spare time, i also on occasion do freelance work. i have a customer that asked me to design something for them. the understanding going in was that i would do (a) (b) and (c) for $x and that if they wanted (d) it would be extra. fine. there’s no set time for me to get this stuff done, and now that (a) (b) and (c) are done, today we learn that there’s been a “misunderstanding” that it was thought that $x included (d).
now i realise this is hard to follow with such generalities, but hear me out: in my effort to be a nice person, i not only did (a) (b) and (c) without so much as a down payment, i did an above-and-beyond job of it. and because i really liked the customer, i even went so far as to add some flourishes and special touches to a part of this project because, after all, it was such a nice customer. i was giving as i’d like to receive. karma-ing, if you will. but now this. now today, this “misunderstanding.” well, guess what? tough! i’m sure there wasn’t a misunderstanding. i know what i said because i was there when i said it. so no, (d) was not included, nor will it be. and furthermore, i’m not giving up (a) (b) and (c) till someone shows me the money!
dammit.
i take this crap enough from co-workers, from the boss and from family. i’m not taking it from customers. no way.
and i'm not gonna take it anymore!