ON FRUSTRATION

I was on call for all of campus last night. And it was a Monday night (which often precede Tuesday mornings), so I didn't think it would be too bad. I mean...it's Monday, right?

I was in a terrible mood all night. One building didn't have heat, and they were never issued space heaters (to issue to their residents). Okay, fine. My building has extras. No problem. Then a room lost power, and no one had keys to open the electrical closet to flip the breaker. Okay, that's frustrating. Local fire alarm. I came back and kicked our back door in frustration and anger (it had been broken for nine days). Then I walked away, turned around, and kicked it again. I was really childish. Another lock problem after that, another heat problem right after THAT. Factor in the fact that I was trying to run my staff meeting at the time and it was kicking my butt.

I finally got a chance to relax and watch my DVR of "Heroes." Finally, the night had calmed dow-what?!?! A FLOOD? I flagged down the maintenance man ten minutes before his shift ended and he was as angry as I had been - slamming the Jeep door and squealing the tires as he pulled away. And at that point, I realized how foolish I had looked when I kicked the door (twice). And how foolish I looked when I threw the duty bag down the hallway, bowling-style. And my frustration and bad mood disappeared. Was I happy about the flood? Of course not. But seeing someone else's ridiculousness made mine a lot easier to tolerate.

I believe it was the wise Calvin* who said "Nothing helps a bad mood like spreading it around." And I wonder if that was the case last night. Because I was grumpy, until I saw someone who was grumpier. And while I am sleepy and a little sluggish today, at least I didn't squeal the tires of the Jeep last night. Plus our door got fixed.



* - the comic strip character, not any other Calvin.