Spite is a Great Motivator
It’s been raining. Kind of a lot. When they say that Colorado gets 300 days of sun a year, it’s not an exaggeration; in fact, sometimes it feels like more. It’s weird when it rains here, so when it rains several days in a row … it’s downright upsetting. I was doing alright initially, but the weather really does affect my mood. I’ve felt mopey and down the past few days when nothing is wrong.
I could see the weather coming in on Sunday afternoon, and I made a comment to a customer checking out at REI. He responded, “I actually love this weather. I love how it makes for a quiet ambience.”
“So does my best friend. He likes that it gives him the opportunity to wear cozy clothes indoors but also sick rain gear outdoors.”
“Ha, so it’s a sort of aesthetic thing for him?”
“I suppose so.”
I need to work to make my rainy day aesthetic not scream “sad girl spring.”
I serve a lot of couples at both of my jobs. For the most part, the dynamics amuse me — there are distinct archetypes. At REI, there’s the male partner who comes in and tells me exactly what sort of hiking boot or running shoe his female partner needs, without her getting so much as a word in. Despite it being her feet, he knows best. There’s also the male partner begrudging that he has to buy new shoes, with his female partner trying desperately to get him to just try a pair on. The male usually insists he doesn’t even know his shoe size, to which she replies, “You’ve always been a size 10!” I hope I am never one half of ones of these couples. But then there are the couples who are buying shoes for one or both individuals in earnest. These couples will tell me each other’s entire shoe stories. She’ll inform me how he’s always worn Hoka Bondis, but she thinks he might branch out to the Hoka Gaviota. He’ll tell me how she’s got a pair of Oboz Sawtooths that she’s worn for the last 10 years. Did you know they’ve been REI members since 1983? These are the couples who really warm my heart.
This is the last bit I will write about REI because I am honestly burnt out scanning pant sizes and telling people that we moved all the “Garage Sale” items to the west building.
It genuinely cracks me up when someone will come up to me and ask, “Do you work here?” No, I just willingly chose to wear a green vest covered in disparate pins and put a radio in my ear that will inevitably fall out. Of course I work there! I am as stereotypical as REI employees come — flannels, Blundstones, beanies, a Melanzana. But part of me thinks that I also just come off as a person who WOULD willingly choose to wear a green vest covered in disparate pins and put a radio in my ear that will inevitably fall out.
I recently wrote about how I’ve developed this new level of equanimity that truly lets everything just wash over me. It actually worked in a super powerful way last week.
I was driving, halfway to Boulder, when my dashboard lit up like a Christmas tree. I had to make a meeting, though, so I soldiered on and decided I’d figure it out when I got there. I had my meeting, then went to O’Reilly to have the code reader see what was up. It was nothing. My gas cap was supposedly loose, which made the dash light up. No sweat. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the O’Reilly employee reset the code, so I’d have to live with all the flashing for a few days until my oil change — which I had ironically scheduled before the drive to Boulder. I could live with that.
A couple of days later, I was driving home from Denver when a rock hit my window. It left a little nick in the windshield, but I brushed it off. I’ll see what I can do Friday. Usually, any crack in my windshield will drive me to distraction. The next day, it rained on and off. I got in my car, and it suddenly occurred to me: the lights on the dash had disappeared. By themselves! Who knew a 2009 Impreza could figure out its problems all on its own?! And then I looked at the windshield to see that the rain had washed away the “nick” — it wasn’t actually a crack, just a mark. I’m going to try to remember this the next time I want to get panicked or frustrated about literally anything.
Toothpaste is one of those things that you never think you’ll need to buy more of, until the tube is mysteriously empty. It happened to me last week. I am relentlessly cheap, so I buy a $2-ish tube of Colgate. The best part of this toothpaste is not the price, but that it literally says, “Great Regular Flavor” on the box.
I was recently on a climbing trip with a bunch of friends, including Jonathan (“Jono”), a skilled climber and potter but also classic 22-year-old. I say “classic” because he brought no food or camping equipment, despite the group agreeing on everyone bringing their own lunch as well as sleeping bags, tents, etc. Though his age comes out like this, he said a couple of things that made me stop — because he said them so casually, but they were actually kind of profound?
The first time came when our friend Brit was attempting a pretty stout boulder problem. Brit has been training like hell, so we felt pretty confident he could send this one. There was just one move on the problem that felt like a tall order. Brit attempted it with improbable beta, to which Jono reacted, “There’s NO WAY that beta is going to work. You’ve got like a one in a thousand chance of getting it that way!” Well, two tries later, Brit successfully did the move (and cursed Jono under his breath). Jono promptly apologized, and quipped, “Spite really is a great motivator.”
As quick as that comment was, I have been thinking about it ever since. How many things have I done out of spite? Countless! It usually stems from being told I can’t do something because I’m a woman — I resent it so much that nothing will stop me from doing that very thing. It may not be the healthiest way to live, but it sure gets sh*t done.
Later, while we hiked out of the boulder field in the dark, our headlamps showed a fine mist encompassing us. “Is that dust?” our friend Casey asked. Jono replied, “It could be — the world becomes a much dirtier place when you hold things up to direct light.” If you read deeply into that sentence … damn.
As a Nuggets fan, the first round of the playoffs was a harrowing experience. I’ve had it easy the last couple of years, us practically sweeping the first round without issue. To go 7 games against the Clippers, so evenly matched, was exhausting. I question how I made it to the finals two years ago. How many beers did I drink watching this team? How many hours did I agonize in front of the television?
I asked these questions after watching us close out the series at the bar. I was at my workplace, since I knew my fellow coworkers, also Nuggets fans, would be there. (And I could have a discounted beer.) After the game, we went straight into watching the Avalanche play in their own game 7, just to blow a 2-0 lead in the last 10 minutes and lose 2-4. As we all yelled and cursed at the TV, a guy a couple seats down from me — a regular I recognized — declared, “You know guys, sports just have to end!” All of us naturally booed at that, but he stood his ground. “I mean, think about it! We spend all this time following these teams, getting upset when they lose, feeling anxious the more they win. Sports just need to end and then we can just enjoy our summers!” I had to admit, he had a point.
