Have you ever done something nice for someone and have them not recognize it, or worse, treat you with disrespect? I'd like to think that the people at my Dartmouth are thoughtful and courteous enough to recognize when someone is doing them a favor. We usually reserve our best face for strangers. (They might be useful to us in ways not immediately apparent.)But we're also hopelessly self-absorbed. Everything that happens to us is a miracle or a tragedy: never mediocre; no middle ground. Any inconvenience is avoided and everything around us is expected to be exactly to our liking. We leave our stuff around the stacks, claiming the best study spots so no one can use them during our multiple-hour-long breaks. And that makes for rather poor manners.
Take a recent example. I happened upon a Dartmouth ID belonging to-- let's call her Kelly-- and immediately went about trying to get it back to her.
--- Nathan wrote:Well done! Curtious, respectful, presents a number of options so the Samaritan can choose the one that is most convenient. However, this is well into the pong-playing night and I could not respond in time. We resume our adventure the next morning.
Hey Kelly,
I found your Dartmouth ID and have it with me now in Rocky 02. Please come and find me if you'd like it back. I should be here for the next couple hours.
Nathan
--- end of quote ---
[many hours later]
--- Kelly wrote:
hey there.. can i meet you at some point tomorrow morning to get my card? or could you drop it by [inconveniently located residential location] at any point tonight? thanks for keeping my card safe.
--- Nathan wrote:So thanks for finding my ID (which authorizes all my DDS and DA$H purchases)! I'd love to get it back but I really don't want to have to look at you while I do it. Even having me stop by your locked and vacant dorm room would be too much contact. Instead, please go somewhere and leave it with a stranger. KThanksBye. Please never talk to me, good Samaritan!
I'm going to be booked for the next few hours so I've taped your card to my door at [dorm room]. Come by and get it when you're free.
Sorry for all this confusion.
Nathan
--- end of quote ---
[many hours later]
--- Kelly wrote:
i don't feel comfortable going to your dorm room. please drop my card off at collis info desk or the library info desk or any other place that does not require me to personally meet wtih you. tomorrow morning before 10 would be nice because I have to work at 10. blitz me to tell me where u left it.
--- Nathan wrote:Snarky, sure, but nothing she didn't already say. Treating someone who is trying to help you like a leper or a knife-wielding rapist is never a good policy of interpersonal politics. Then again threatening them isn't either:
Well, Kelly, I had assumed that you came and retrieved your ID from [my hallway door] because when I returned from the errands I was running all day, I saw that it was no longer there. If you don't have it, I have no idea where it went and therefore am no longer a party to your predicament. The only consolation for you, I guess, is that you will not have to meet me in person.
Nathan
--- Kelly wrote:No, please do file that report. It's not like you agreed to meet in blitz #2 or anything. Has Kelly confused a Hanover Dorm with a back alley in The Bronx? And for the record, someone really did come and take her card and it is unfortunate that it wasn't her.
Well, Nathan, you should have done what any normal person does in the first place when they find a card, which is bring it to the collis info desk. it's really sketchy for a guy to force a girl to meet her in person in order to retrieve their card. whether or not you intended to act like a creep, YOU DID. thanks a lot for losing my card man.
p.s. you should work on your manners and learn some respect and common sense. i have EVERY RIGHT to be creeped out by a person like you and you don't need to respond to me with a smart ass tone when i tell you that i don't feel comfortable meeting you in person. on top of all that, im going to have to buy a new card because you did exactly what you shouldn't have done when you found mine. i could probably report you. maybe i should.
Here's some free advice. If you ever want someone to do something for you, being friendly and assuming good faith are great starts. Self-importance and douchbaggery never wins many favors -- or friends.
What a self-righteous bitch. I bet she's the type that automatically assumes every guy who so much as smiles at her is hitting on her. This is a classic example of why people at Dartmouth suck. Let me guess, she's a '13.
ReplyDeleteThis is frustratingly amusing. And whoever Kelly actually is is bitchtasticly annoying.
ReplyDeleteLet her report you. Just show S&S this post as your defense and they won't be able to stop laughing at her until after your judicial hearing clears you. That is, if they're able to stop laughing hard enough TO clear you.
ReplyDeleteWell...just look at what happened...her card got stolen from the (very obvious and public) place that you left it. I work at the info desk, and you would be suprised at how many people come by acting sketchy with other people's cards (they want to return them in person and won't turn them in, want me to blitz someone for them, etc)...Where did you find the card in the first place? Carrying it around with you everywhere doesn't make much sense or help out very much or make much sense as compared to turning it in somewhere...:(
ReplyDeletegreenerthanthou:
ReplyDeleteOne: How is the dorm room obvious?
Two: Why would people come to you to blitz about lost cards? They have blitz themselves and would likely just blitz the person outright.
Three: What's so sketchy about wanting credit for a good deed?
Four: You are clearly the girl in this story because I work in Collis and this shit NEVER happens.
Five: Where in the story does Bruschi carry around the card. Oh, that's right, never!
"Kelly" in this story is Chelsey Luger, 2010
ReplyDeleteIf you're living in Hanover and creeped out by meeting up with a fellow Dartmouth student, you should probably just give up on life now.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDelete@1:52am
ReplyDeleteYour post says more about you than anyone else.
The card says TU 10 so obviously the card can't be Chelsey Luger's who is a 10 or a 13s.
ReplyDelete@5:26 PM
ReplyDeleteActually, the card in the picture is just a random ID I found on Google, not the one belonging to "Kelly." It would be ridiculous for me to take a picture of the ID while it was in my possession and especially before all this nonsense concluded.
As slightly self-righteous anecdotes go...this was a real pleasure to read. The narrative was well-paced, the sarcasm was present but not overly thick, and the moral was well-delivered.
ReplyDelete