First impressions

Here's something I've thought for a while, but now I'm convinced. I give horrible first impressions. People who just meet me don't like me. When they get to know me, I think people like me (at least the ones I want to hang out with tend to). And because of that, I wouldn't even care about the first impressions thing. I'd be fine just waiting it out until people got to know me better. But the big problem is that that makes interviews really hard. Very few times have I ever been called back after an interview. I got called back for a research position from someone who just wanted hardworking grunt labor to run experiments. I got invited back from someone who had pretty much already given me the job and I was practically interviewing her to see if I was interested. And I got invited back to Berkeley for grad school (though that was a close call). I really can't think of anything else. However I can think of several times that I've been rejected from jobs I thought I would be perfect for and was certain no one else could do better than me. I got rejected from a cognitive linguistics research position that was along the lines of Lakoff's research and looked really interesting. I got rejected for a TA position for cogsci 1, even after one of the other TAs told the professor that she and I work well together and she'd prefer to work with me. And today I got rejected from a teaching placement for the fall that I really wanted. He didn't even tell me. He told Dan who then had to relay that information to me when I already thought it was a done deal.

I remember Susan telling me once that she's gotten an offer from every place where she's gotten as far as an interview. I wish I was that good at first impressions. I think I come off as gruff and mean, which is how I naturally am a little (if you don't know me well - I'm pretty scrappy at times). Except when I'm trying to suppress the crankiness I think I come off as fake or insincere. People who get to know me realize that I don't mean most of the cranky things I say and I'm not really as critical as I sound, but I think the first impression people get is not so great. I think even Susan, who I consider one of my closest friends now, didn't think anything of me when we first met. I should ask actually, but she might not remember - I don't think I made much of an impression. Moving in halfway through spring, I don't think I made much of an impression on anyone. Newcomers often find it hard to get to know people in the house once friendships have already formed. By anyway, my earliest memory of Susan was cooking with her when Marlee had signed out of the shift. I don't know what I was thinking. I had never cooked before. I remember Steven helped me, but even with the extra pair of hands, we were really slow. I remember peeling a mountain of potatoes and being told to hurry up because they needed to go in soon to be ready in time. I remember cutting an enormous bowl of onions and not having the sense to stand away from the finished product (or to dump them in water to suck up the tearful onion juice). Steven and I were one big ball of tears. I think Susan was not ecstatic about dealing with two incompetent sous chefs in place of one competent one when she was concerned about being ready in time for dinner, but we finished on time, so everything was good.

Perhaps this story is out of place because most of the time, first impressions do not take place in high stress situations, but even with someone I get along with really well, I don't think I made a great first impression. I'm trying to think back to other close friends and see if I can remember how things went the first time I met them... Dylan I had a very negative first impression of as I recall, but I don't think he had a negative impression of me. Actually, I got the sense he was so concerned with trying to be polite that he wasn't really paying attention to anyone else. Hmmm... maybe he's bad with first impressions too, or at least was freshman year. He's quite a bit more suave now. Steven's first impression of me wasn't too interesting either. He told me his first thought was, "Oh. Alex has a girlfriend." Then a few days later, "Oh, nevermind. I guess Michael has a girlfriend." And that was about it.

So I don't know of anyone who had an overwhelmingly positive first experience with me. I can't really think of anyone who had even a slightly positive first experience, but put in the same enclosed space for long enough (with Dylan, that was being on the same floor of the dorms and with Susan that was Stebbins), or with the same group of people for long enough (with Steven that was hanging out with the nerds), I think I eventually grow on people.

But perhaps I'm not looking at this correctly. Just because my closest friends were not super close to me the first time we met doesn't mean that no one was. Actually, much to my chagrin, I think I make a great first impression on conservative old people. I guess that's not something to get too upset about, but I'd rather make a good first impression on people I'd like to hang out and work with. If I only get job offers from old conservative schools and none from any liberal schools, I'm going to have a problem. When I'm around conservatives, I can tell and I become very quiet, well mannered, and respectful. I get on my "I do what I'm supposed to do" face. I guess it's just a reflex I picked up in high school. Actually, whether they're conservative or not, I try to treat old people respectfully. I think they're not treated well in general. I once went to a nursing home in high school. A friend convinced me to volunteer to spend some time with them. She said they really appreciated the attention. Bull shit. I lost all respect for her after that day. She spent the whole hour singing (she was in an a capella group) and smiling. I had to leave partway through the hour to cry in the bathroom because I couldn't believe anyone could treat people the way these old people were treated. They were all strapped down in chairs, not allowed to walk around. Who cares that exercise prolongs your life? It was obvious that people had stuck their old parents there to die, and the sooner they did, the sooner they could stop paying nursing home bills. One person kept telling me that if I could just get word to her sister, her sister would come and take her away from there. She was practically begging me to help her escape. I felt so awful, but all I could think was that her sister was probably dead. Another one kept trying to talk to me in an asian language I couldn't understand. I tried to understand her. I wished I could. She was so insistent and she kept trying, but it was no use. How could my friend have kept smiling during all that? Ever since then, I've gotten an idea of how poorly old people can be treated sometimes. Our society doesn't really value the elderly. Younger is always better, hence aging celebrities always getting plastic surgery to stay in the limelight just a bit longer; no one wants to look at wrinkles. Once an aging person retires and their money runs out, they become a burden and are shoved away. I admit, it was really hard to visit my grandpa during his last days. He was in so much pain and was so unhappy. He would yell at my grandma and make her run all over fetching his footrest, removing his footrest, getting him a blanket, getting him some salt, insulting her cooking, to the point that it was really hard to watch. My uncle never visited during his last years. My mom came over frequently, but she was always depressed by the sight. How would I deal with a senile parent? I don't know how I'd handle it for sure, but I am certain that I would not put one of my parents in a nursing home with people who don't love then and who don't feel the need to cry at the sight of old people being shoved away.

So anyway back to my main point, I tend to make a good impression on older people. I think it's just because I listen to them and treat them with respect, which is something they may not be used to. They might not even realize that they're unused to it (maybe just get a sense that they like me), though chances are they probably do. By that age, people generally realize what's going on around them. Or they become senile from lack of thinking about that kind of stuff their whole life, in which case you probably aren't having a conversation with them anyway.

So I think I can make a good impression on certain types of people, but there are a lot of people who I don't think I make much of an impression on. But that whole side ramble about the elderly gives me an idea. I make a good impression on old people because I respect them. Maybe I don't respect random people I meet enough. It's true that I generally don't give other people the benefit of the doubt until I get to know them a little. I'd rather be wary of someone new and become friends slower than be open and friendly and get burned by someone mean. There are a lot of mean people out there. I think that teacher who didn't want to work with me (the guy who spawned this blog post) was kind of mean. I was trying to be friendly, but I guess I didn't come off right. He told Dan that his class was a really urban setting and he didn't think I was a good fit. What's that supposed to mean? Did he just call me a racist? Or did he just think I'd be unable to relate? Unfortunately, that may be true. I really didn't know how to reach some of my minority students and a lot of them stopped coming to class. Was that because of me or because they had been struggling for months and hated the class? I'll never know. It was probably due to a lot of things actually and not really me. One girl never showed up for her first period class, so I shouldn't take that one personally. Another girl just did what that first one did and also stopped showing up (also she was going through a lot at home and had to move in with her grandma because of some problems with her parents - that could not have made it easier to focus on school). But with these two cases, and probably with some others as well, I don't know that I supported them enough. Honestly, I don't think I could have prevented the things that happened and certainly not alone. Maybe if things had been going fine at home and their parents had decided that education was really important and they were going to work with their kids to always do homework and all their friends didn't moan about how awful math was, it would have been different. But that's not the way it was and I didn't know how to change things so that they could have been better. So maybe this jerk teacher was right and maybe I would have had trouble with the kids, but to me, that just means I should be in there working on it more, not that I should be turned away as a hopeless case. I was willing to learn. I still am, but I guess it won't be with him. And maybe that was just a bull shit excuse and he just didn't like me. I don't know. But he shouldn't have lead me on and made me think he was willing to work with me. He was really nice and was talking about how he'd support me and take notes during class and how we could talk after class because that's when lunch would be. I really got the impression that he was going to work with me. I never suspected that he was going to write Dan an email right after meeting with me to say that he didn't like me and wouldn't work with me. And it's even more insulting that he didn't send that email to me and that he made Dan be the messenger. Dan told me he'd been dreading our meeting because he didn't want to be the bearer of bad news. What a jerk to shove that off on someone else.

Steven told me that I dodged a bullet by giving this mean guy a negative first impression. He told me that if this guy had liked me, he still would have been a jerk who was willing to do a scummy thing like that and I'd be stuck working with him (since I didn't realize what a jerk he was and would have been happy to work with him until I got his rejection via Dan). He also said that of the six jobs he applied for, he was only given one job offer. He even made it to a second round interview with another place before he never heard from them again (jerks). But in any event, getting one job offer after applying to 6 places is considered a great percentage. He's convinced that his average would have only gone down if he applied more places. Now a 1 out of 6 is a failing grade in school, but in job offers, all you need is one and his one offer was an amazing job, so he considers it an A+. I agree. I don't think he could have worked anywhere better.

So maybe I'll get rejected from a lot of places. I mean, it's bound to happen. And maybe it's a good thing that a jerk rejected me. But I wish I could have been the one doing the rejections. Susan does great at all her interviews and then she has the option of picking and choosing between them. She went on an interview for a management position at some department store (I forget which), but as soon as she found out she was going to have to work weekends, she lost interest (essentially turning them down during the interview). And it wasn't a problem because she had an interview somewhere else and got not only a job offer, but a job offer with really good pay. I want to be able to pick and choose too. I really think I'm qualified for most of the jobs I apply for. And not just qualified, I generally think I'm the best applicant (maybe that arrogance doesn't suit me during interviews...). But it's so frustrating being a great applicant, but getting rejected because I don't rub some interviewer the right way. I know that as a math teacher I'm in pretty high demand, so no matter what, I know I'm going to get some job. And I know that at whatever job I get, I'm going to do well (or learn to do well) and make a niche for myself. But it's probably not going to be on my terms. I'm probably not going to be the one picking and choosing. I should be able to move at some point. When I have more job experience, I'll look better to people and perhaps looking at my resume will color their first impression in a positive way. Things will work out I'm sure, but right now in my fledgling stages, I'm not in a great position when I have to rely more heavily on my first impression charm.