Monday, July 31, 2006

Are you afraid of my Guatemala-ness?

In the course of my work, I come across some real chatters.  The first time I meet a client, it's because they've been locked up, and I'm trying to get them released pending the rest of their case.  The chatters seem to enjoy recounting every irrelevant detail from the time of their conception to the moment of their arrest.  I recently had an entire day of chatters, which made it nearly impossible to move as quickly as I hoped.
 
There was one client I had who just would not let me end the conversation.  I was starting to get stressed that the conversation was taking too long, and I was getting annoyed that I wasn't getting to more clients.  I remembered some advice one of my mentors gave me recently - this job is like kung fu.  Don't meet force with force - accept the force and redirect it.  Go with it, don't fight it.
 
So as I resigned myself to listening to this very chatty, very animated gentleman recount how he got arrested, I tried to figure out who he reminded me of, when it hit me:  He spoke JUST LIKE Agador Spartacus from The Birdcage.  I was desperately trying to hold back giggles, so much that my stomach hurt.  The rest of the conversation was a pleasure.

2 comments:

frillgirl said...

I'm going to tuck that great piece of advice away for future use!

Admin said...

Wow. You've got far more patience than I. Even with a pithy saying like that, there's no way I would have been able to sit tight while my client babbled on and on. Good for you!