I dreamed I had brought my parents with me to the mall and told them to wait for me for just a minute, I had to take a quick side trip to Ruby Tuesday's, but it wasn't for food. I'm not sure exactly what I needed, but it was along the lines of information from a poster outside the main dining area.
Then, someone left without paying their $7 bill, and they thought I was the one who hadn't paid.
I assured them I wasn't, but I couldn't explain why I was there, because I wasn't there to eat. I knew they wouldn't understand if I'd explained it and I didn't owe them an explanation anyway.
So, because I wouldn't pay, I ended up washing dishes to cover the tab, because I couldn't prove I wasn't the one, but also wasn't going to pay for something I didn't do.
I'd told my parents I'd be right back, and now I was washing endless dishes.
I wasn't sure what to do. I stopped washing dishes and walked into the dining room to leave.
The restaurant service had ended and the servers were having a meeting with the manager who was explaining to them that the tips they'd earned would be less because of the theft they were erroneously blaming on me.
The servers shook their heads at me as I walked out and I was annoyed with myself for having washed any dishes at all. Had I lost my sense of right and wrong? I wouldn't pay the $7, but washing the dishes was the same as paying.
I wasn't angry at the servers, self-righteously judging me when I hadn't done anything wrong. They were just a bunch of ignorami.
I didn't know what I wanted to do. Insist I hadn't eaten without paying? I didn't even care that they thought I had. I didn't even care that they were judging and blaming me. I didn't even care about righting the wrong done to me. I was annoyed I hadn't done what I needed to do and then left instead of washing dishes at all because it resulted in me keeping other people, who were expecting me to show up, waiting.
I'd allowed the ignorance of others to compromise my integrity. I'd told my parents I'd be right back, and should have known it was more important to keep that promise than to give the false accusations any merit at all. Giving them merit only fed their energy.
I walked out and found my mom, who was worried, but not angry, about waiting, and we found dad looking at a life-sized orange gorilla stuffed animal with silver embellishments around its brow and shoulders in a museum store.
I explained I didn't know the Ruby Tuesday thing would take so long and we left.
What's the point?
I think, two things.
- The stories people make up about you don't matter because they actually have nothing to do with you.
- We can walk away from drama whenever we want to.
great lesson learned
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