patience tank.

you've heard of the "love tank", no doubt.  you know - when it's full, you're feeling fulfilled in your relationship(s), and when it's running on empty, you're feeling low. 

similar in concept, i imagine my own personal level of patience to be found in my "patience tank" - i start fresh in the morning with a full tank.  as the day progresses, it naturally declines as i use up my store. 

little gems throughout the day can definitely boost that level in my tank back up a notch.  those things can include sex, a good talk with a friend, a beer (or whatever your poison may be - just not tequila!), a nap, exercise...i could go on, but i won't for your sake.  you get the picture.  extra injections of patience throughout the day are certainly possible, the way i imagine it.

then, there are the patience-sucks that drain your tank more quickly than would naturally occur.  like a headache.  or pms.  assholes.  ____<-- you can fill in the blank (feel free to comment below). 

i spent my morning - two hours of it, to be exact - in a patience-sucking environment.  it was a powerful suck-age in meeting form with a kind but overly verbose man.  i'll provide further insight in a moment, but to give you a visual...

my patience tank currently looks about like this:

i'm running very low...especially for the time of day.  it's my lunch break, and i'm right around where i ought to be around bed time.  i feel as if my patience quota has been unfairly depleted, stolen from me and the rest of the world forced to encounter me for the remaining hours of the day...unless, of course, i get refueled at some point.  i see a glass of pinot noir in my future (and hopefully some sex).

anyway.  back to the patience depletor.

he's a good guy, this man.  let's call him mr. morningkill (or "mr. m" for short).  he has good intentions.  he's a little dated for the modern working world, but fairly intelligent. 

did i mention he's verbose?

he's the kind of person who can describe one word with 100.  who makes his point by making 10 points that are only vaguely relevant.  he speaks slowly, intentionally, and endlessly.  he repeats himself, just to be sure you got it.  he doesn't believe you when you say you had it before he "taught it to you"...and so he repeats the process. 

it reminds me of the moment in sandlot, when one of the boys describes things getting lost to "the beast" ...a moment in which he says, "f-o-r-e-v-e-r!!!"  yeah.  that's how long this meeting seemed to take.

halfway though, i pulled the "ladies room" card, tried to keep my face in a similar expression as to that it had held during our meeting, and went to look in the mirror.  did it reveal annoyance?  for sure.  was it offensive?  hopefully not...but mr. m can be sensitive.  so i practiced my best, fake, looking-forward-to-whatever-you-have-to-say smiles, and headed back into the danger zone.

don't worry.  i made it out alive.  but with a perilously low patience tank.

perhaps my patience tank is smaller than that of other people.  i have debated that before.  or perhaps it's just my personal triggers for patience depletion, my susceptibility to the patience-suck, which are more commonly found in daily life than those patience-sucks belonging to other folks.  for me, it includes things such as the following:

-blatant stupidity
-people who don't actually listen
-dirty spaces
-sleep deprivation & hunger
-people who think they are more attractive/intelligent/funny than they actually are
-poor vocabulary
-whining
-close-mindedness
-wasting time

i'm a girl who likes to get shit done.  most things (i hate checking my mail...one of a very few exceptions).  i like to be efficient.  i like to get to the point.  i like productivity, and i like concise meetings. 

what sucks your patience?  do you have your own version of my mr. morningkill? 

...am i just an impatient asshole?

share your thoughts.