Fri 5 Feb 2010
Rarely-recurring etiquette question
Posted by pseudo under work
[7] Comments
The normal secretary in our office has been on vacation all week, and we’ve had a substitute secretary, a very nice lady named Marge, who is ENTIRELY THE OPPOSITE of our normal secretary who owns a tricked out Harley and wears both a leather vest and leather pants to work on semi-regular basis (not joking).
On Wednesday, Marge started crying, rather noisily, at her desk. My coworker and I went out to investigate (we are not made of stone) and found her mopping at her eyes with paper towels (we are not made of stone, but we are not made of money, either, and we were out of Kleenex. At Marge’s suggestion, I went down to procurement and got some raggedy one-ply tissues, which were a minor improvement over the paper towels, plus now I know they have tissues in procurement. Never have to buy office tissues again, bitches!)
It turns out that Marge’s father is very sick. He’s probably dying. Poor Marge and her sister are trying to set up hospice care so he can get out of the hospital and come home. We heard about this in some detail on Wednesday when the crying jag happened. Then again on Wednesday afternoon as we came back from lunch. Then again on Wednesday evening as Marge was leaving for the day.
Thursday he was worse. Marge is a mess. She cried several times at work. She left early to go home and help her sister finalize plans for bringing their dad home. As she was leaving, she said they weren’t sure he was going to make it through the night.
I feel terrible for Marge. This is a very difficult thing she’s going through. But I also…how do I put this delicately…. I don’t really KNOW Marge. I cannot think of much I can say that would be comforting. You know who I do know? My boss. You know what I know about him? He is not the sort to really take a shine to his employees spending an hour over the course of the work day nodding sympathetically and listening to the woes of a substitute secretary. Yesterday, I heard Marge talking to him for at least fifteen minutes about her dad. You don’t know my boss, but trust me when I say that a fifteen minute conversation about ANYTHING would make him twitchy- he’s a fast-moving guy- and I could hear him getting more and more impatient as the conversation ran on and on.
Today is Marge’s last day with us, probably. Our regular secretary is scheduled to come back on Monday. But I wonder: how best to handle it when a near-stranger tells you a LOT about a very difficult family situation? At work? Where your boss would like you to be, you know, working? I do not want to abandon Marge- she seems like a lovely lady and she’s clearly struggling- but I’m just not sure what to say. What is the proper way to give support (and potentially condolences) to a near-stranger who has a demonstrated ability to talk at some length and in tremendous detail about a very difficult family situation? Can I continue to nod sympathetically and say “mmm,” and “oh, that’s hard,” or is there something more specific, perhaps, that I should offer? Potentially something that will get me back to my desk in under 30 minutes? Or should I just say eff it to my work and give her as much time as she needs to talk it out? Truly, give me a script here, people. I’m at a loss.
Tough one, my friend, tough. I’m not sure there is the perfect solution to this situation. Everyone would likely handle it differently.
It reminds me when I attended the funeral of a very good friend’s father. He was only in his 60s when he passed away (her mother passed away when she was a child). I overheard someone telling her that her dad’s work *here* was done. He saw her brother settle down with a beautiful woman and they were pregnant with their first child. He saw his daughter (my friend) be successful at work and be preparing for her own wedding. This person told her all the pieces were in place and it was ok to let go (even though, his death was sudden).
I found comfort in those words. Even from a spiritual, not very religious stance. I’m not even sure if those words (or a version of them) are appropriate for your situation, but I wanted to share that with you.
I have a terrrrrible time extricating myself from such things. When I waitressed, it was common for me to get caught talking to someone about their sad life. Ditto when I’d work the register at the pharmacy. In both cases it was something recurring so it really needed a solution, and in my case I solved it by explaining the problem to my boss and saying I didn’t want to brush off our customers but on the other hand…. And so then my boss would start calling out, “Swistle! Back to work please!” when he saw I was stuck, so I could roll my eyes and wink at the customer and then GET BACK TO WORK.
If this were the regular secretary, I’d probably start pushing her compassionately to take some time off. Since she’s a relief secretary just for this week, I’d try to avoid her for most of the day and then let her talk to me a bit at lunch or at the very end of the day, and I’d be really relieved it wasn’t going to be an ongoing thing.
This is my response: …
Tough one, my friend. I’d be avoidy avoidy person. Just try not to be around her. I don’t know how possible that is (she’s your secretary), but…avoid, avoid, avoid. Eyes on work, you’re never going to see her again, you’ve already been more than kind.
But I’m cold-hearted, I think.
UGH. That is a tough one.
I think like NGS said, you could avoid since she isn’t your secretary and she won’t be there much longer.
Or on the other hand, since she won’t be there much longer, you could just listen and know that it won’t be like this for months on end.
I’d imagine she probably doesn’t have a lot of people to talk to about it, hence why she’s telling you. And she probably just wants to talk and get it out. So just listening would be fine.
ooof. i don’t know. i kind of like swistle’s suggestion, though – maybe get your coworker to “call you” after a 10 min window? and you can do the same for her?
As both a legal secretary and as someone who’s done a LOT of temping lately, I am saying that what she is doing is very unprofessional. It’d be bad enough if she were taking time away from her own work to be making phone calls to arrange this hospice care, but to take OTHERS away from THEIR work?
I know it sounds cold, but there are people (like me) out there who are desperately scraping together enough for rent each month who would be fully focused at a temp job and it’s not fair.
I think you should pat her on the shoulder and say something like, “This is such a difficult situation, I’m keeping you and your dad in my thoughts. Sorry – gotta get back to work before El Jefe yells.” Then walk away. If you say that before she gets too far into her twice-daily update on the situation it should go okay.
P.S. I also think your boss should call her temp agency and let them know that she’s a great secretary (if she is) but her father is dying and she’s taking it pretty hard and may need some personal time next week. Maybe she can’t afford to take time off so that may be really screwing her, I don’t know. But the way she’s behaving at work is outrageously inappropriate.
You hate me now, I know.
Yeah, I’d get stuck until I developed an escape plan with a coworker. Since it’s a temporary thing I’d just deal with it. If she were permanent perhaps the boss could suggest that she take a few days off to focus on her family.