I understand how people are driven to sheer madness or extreme violence... both share a similar release and could have found a home with me in my mid-afternoon on-site shouting match with my plumber.
It’s a very interesting feeling to be emotionally removed from a person and... listening... really listening... to them curse you out.
Everyone has their boiling point, but when they reach it... everyone uses that heightened state of being in a different way. For my plumber, he decided he wanted to up and tell me that I can stick my project where the sun doesn't shine and begin to throw in subtle classicist comments that made me, not specifically, but still acutely, aware that not everyone in the conversation wears a tie on a regular basis, passes diplomas in home hallways, or frequents banana republic outlet stores.
Maybe it was important for me to hear him in his weasel-like aggressive stance lambaste me for my frequent changes to the project. After all, he doesn't know about the growahouse movement. He just sees me telling him to do things differently than it is stated on the drawings. How could he see the forest for the trees? He doesn't know that he is connecting the pipes of change... wrenching the infrastructure of revolution... sealing the conduits that will touch the lives of the masses.(I might have stretched it a bit on that last one)
Anyway... I haven't let him in on the heart of this project, but I am holding him accountable for committing his passion.
That is not to say that he is without blame... or without compensation. He has been, and obviously continues, to act out of order and he righteously deserved a smack in the mouth today. But outside of conversation and contractual implications, I cannot hold him accountable to his own demons. Only he can do that. I have my own demons. I do, however, know I was right in the argument...
And now as I sit at my desk... after having called the plumber back to ease the strife, make sure he finishes out his contract, and secretly ensure that he doesn't set my house on fire tonight... I have to ask myself...
What is the price of being right?
What is it worth to me? Would really laying back into him more than I did have solved anything for me? Would it have connected the pipes any faster?... maybe? I'm not sure. Would I feel better having poked him tauntingly in the forehead and told him to "bounce... before I do something I'll regret.”?
probably...but what is the true price of feeling right?
... not righteous.... but right.