Trust Me By Linda Stowe
There is a saying that we should never trust a person who begins with “Trust me,” or believe someone who feels compelled to add that they don’t lie. I don’t know if that’s always true, but it must be true enough for the saying to exist in the first place.
I once had a coworker who bragged more than once that she would never steal. She was, she said, as honest as the day was long. I sometimes wondered about her definition of honesty. While I never saw her carrying home reams of paper, I knew she had quite a collection of Sinclair pens at her house. And what about the hours of work time she spent chatting with friends, stretching lunch breaks, or slipping out early?
There was nothing to tempt her, because she didn’t see those pens or that time as theft. If she thought about it at all, she likely decided it was her right because she assumed everybody else was doing it.
Wordle guess words: about, exist, tempt, theft
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A great lesson. I sometimes harbor ill feelings when people get things “wrong” in my book.
I have a big problem with people who lie. I think it is because I used to lie quite a bit while I was drinking. All those years of covering things up or stretching the truth. Now in sobriety for 21 years, I try very hard not to lie. Although I must admit, I am still not error-free. It happens from time to time.
I also used to have a problem with people who didn’t do their jobs. It included the slackers. This used to be a huge pet peeve of mine. In fact, I left a job because of this.
Finally, on the subject of those missing Sinclair pens. One more of my pet peeves is those people who try to beat the system. This was huge when the Amazon FireStick came out. There was an easy hack that let people download movies without paying for them. Well. Unfortunately, this behavior affects those people who are honest and pay their way. Our rates go up as subscribers due to all the people who are ripping off the system.
And there it is. My little list of peeves.
But. Linda’s piece delivers a great message. People shift the rules to accommodate their own behaviors. This was a perfect example.
