Me and Stitch

Remember this adorable space alien? He was "programmed to destroy," and it took all of his self-control to tone it down and at least try to fit in with Lilo and the rest of his new earth family. Stitch and I have something in common. I have to fight the impulse to do what I seem to have been programmed to do …

Fix things.

One of my coworkers gives me a great deal of agita. For the past year, I have been trying to warn of what should be obvious -- our agency is in trouble. The rumors are buzzing through the halls and one of the daily papers keeps dutifully reporting everything that goes wrong. While I hope the rumors are just hot air, I have reminded her that none of us can afford to operate solely on hope. We should keep our shoulders to the wheel, give our clients the best possible service, and try very hard to give management reasons to KEEP US AND NOT LET US GO, should it come to that.

Yet my coworker remains remarkably uninvolved with her job. She's the one who provides the graphics that illustrate my words, so we work closely together. Last week and now this week, I have had to push her to do more than bare minimum. Today I told her that releasing a brochure that we know looks bad amounts to "malpractice." We need to revisit it and improve it. I must have tweaked her conscience because she came through and did a good job.

Then she told me that our other project would have to be "on hold" until Wednesday because she just couldn't get to it today. She feels stretched too thin. I told her I'd discuss it with our boss. I didn't want her doing it, because she has already earned a reputation with him of not caring very much. I thought he'd take it better from me. Um … he didn't. He said, "You can have an extra day or two. But if she's so worried about due dates, maybe she should hang up the phone once in a while." Gulp.

He's right, of course. She's not very dedicated to this job, and she doesn't care who sees it. I feel like I'm carrying her and I resent it.

On the other hand, she hasn't asked me to look out for her, so I guess it shouldn't offend me when she doesn't heed my unsolicited advice. And since she is borderline annoying at best, I wonder why I can't leave well enough alone and let her sink or swim on her own.

I know why. She told me how much she (over)paid for her new condo. She needs this job. And because this is how I'm like Stitch: I'm programmed, too. I'm programmed to fix things, and I don't know how to stop.