Cinco de Mayo

I am a hard worker, both in the sense of quality and quantity. Even though I am far from being the smartest or fastest cookie in the package, I do try hard at the office and I am up to anything. If there's shit to do, I won't volunteer myself first, obviously; but if I see that things are not in the direction they should be, or if people assigned to certain projects and tasks look like they're not gona make it, I usually step in and help. I also have very good relations with all my coworkers, all the bosses that I have, and those people that according to the company orgchart are below my position. I don't give to anyone of them the false impression that I love them, but they do know that from me they can expect respect and fairness. Until the caffeine worns out, of course.

Today around mid-morning I headed for the water cooler to get some more coffee, and also to get away from the phone that had been ringing all morning like crazy. Sometimes around the water cooler the usual group of people gather around and is a good time to talk about nothing, to listen to different stories from different characters, and forget for a couple minutes all my responsibilities. From Ray I'll get stories about Viagra and all the crazy sex that he has with his wife; from Ardelle I'll get a daily doses of whining and marital problems with her boyfriend -or is it ex boyfriend now?-; from Lex there'll be plenty of stories about his daughter and how boring his life is; from Rudy there's plenty of talking about how much money he'd been spending and how much he would like in order to buy some crap that he doesn't even need; from Gregorio (a.k.a. chubby) there'll be lots of jokes on his belly and my red hair; from James I won't get many stories, his life is so fucked up these days that he doesn't even know what to say; and from other people like "useless" Mike I'll get a lot of talking on football, basketball, baseball and shit that I don't care about.

From me they don't get much, I'm not really that talkative and specially not with these people that I work with. I'll tell them some stories everynow and then, usually good things and funny shit that happens to me on regular basis, but nothing really special. They don't know who I date, who I sleep with and overall what my life outside the office looks like. When I first got this job I tried to get close to them and to make them part of my life, but they were not really willing to let this red-haired foreigner in their lives; so after a couple of hard landings I learnt my lesson. Now that they know that I wasn't just a STRANGE alien in their office, but someone who's really cool and very professional on the things he does, they've tried to get close to me, but I'd built a big wall between us. At the beginning I was in need of friends and people to hang out with, but now that I got them outside my office the truth of the matter is that I don't need my co-workers outside the office building.

So this morning when I went to the water cooler, Linda was pouring herself a cup of half and half with a splash of coffee -and not the other way around. She's the one that talks the most shit among the people I have to deal with, and her stories are so boring and so filled with half truths, lies, and tragedies that I always avoid her. I've made this clear to her with my actions and body language, but she still approaches me with her little stories. Today after exchanging with her the usual "hi, how are you" she went on to ask me if I also "celebrate the Cinco de Mayo holiday". I replied to her with a very icy tone "Cinco de Mayo is strictly a Mexican holiday". I then turned around, grabbed a Styrofoam cup and poured few drops of half and half before reaching for the coffee pot.

"Oh. . . , So, . . . do you celebrate Cinco de Mayo. . .?" -she asked me again.

If I have had my cup full, I would've poured the hot coffee in her face -figuratively speaking of course. But I managed to excuse myself and went to the restroom to splash some cold water on my face before having to stab her to dead with one of the plastic knifes on the coffee station.

I've told my coworkers several times about my past, my "racial" origins and the places I've lived in. A big chunk of my life was spent in South America therefore I consider that part of me is Latino; also, due to my appearance, my name, my parents, friends and part of my education I'm European; and that I also lived in China and that I just love that country. Now, after more than three years living in the heart of the Bible Belt, I've assimilated some of the trends, traditions and I've grown to learn and like/dislike the US, just as with any other region/country where I've lived in. I've tried to explain how's life outside the US borders, and how different people in different continents have different realities and different interests, and that there's also different currencies and different holidays and different national heroes. But after all that effort and all that talking that I've had with them about the world, to get her to say that pretty much south of the Rio Grande everything is "Mexico", at least this morning, it was more than I could swallow.

After that little encounter I went back to my office to do some more work and perhaps an hour later I went back to the water cooler. There I ran into Gregorio and James who were talking and having some coffee. Being Gregorio from Mexico, I told them the story about Linda and the "Cinco de Mayo" without missing the smallest detail, I even mention to them the plastic knife and my idea to stab her. We laughed like crazy, even more so when I told them that for her maybe south of the Rio Grande "everything was Mexico" and James said. . .

"Do you mean not everything down there is Mexico. . . ?"

That dirty rat. We laughed so much that even Rudy came to see what was going on. And when we told him the story, we all burst in laughs again.

This is what I mean when I said that you have to make the most out of any situation, even a silly little story like this one. So, Feliz Cinco de Mayo and no, south of the Rio Grande not everything is Mexico! Cheers!