Passing

An odd thing happened this morning - and I am trying to figure something out about myself that had never occurred to me before. Someone I really did not like much at all passed away last week, and I really have not got a clue about how to act/react to the news.

Barb, the woman who was my second-in-command when I first took over the company died of cancer. She was quite a bit older than me, and had been one of the first people hired at the company. When I first took charge, she seemed very supportive but over time - especially as I started making changes and not working closely with her any more - she decided I was a bad choice to run the company.

I know because she started writing to my bosses in the US telling them they should fire me if they wanted the company to survive. They had the good sense to A) ignore her and B) not tell me about her rantings until she had retired.

I am not the sort of person who holds grudges. Not because I'm a saint, but I have never been the sort to let things bother me for long. But I definitely am the sort of person who can decide I don't want to deal with some one anymore and just ignore them. Once I learned how much she had worked to try to make me fail, I forgot about Barb. And I haven't had a word with her since she retired more than a decade ago.

Now LK is wired a bit differently from me. Being my staunchest defender, she disliked Barb much more than I did for what what she had done, but then I am fairly certain Mrs Ghandi was a real bitch-on-wheels when people went after the Mahatma. However, LK's reaction to the news of Barb's death was that it was sad.

As I said at the beginning of this post, I really don't have a clue how to act/react. I didn't want any harm to come to Barb - certainly did not want her to have cancer leading to her death - but I cannot force myself to feel bad that she has passed away. Call it cold, but how do you manufacture feelings? You either have them or you don't.

Still, it feels odd to me. Odd to have worked closely with someone for many years, to have shared hours of thoughts and ideas, to have turned around the company -- only to have almost no feeling about her at all when she passes away.

Oh well, enough of the self-confession. I guess when I forget about someone, I really do.

And if you would like to know if you're on my Do-Not-Care-About-Them-Anymore list, just drop me a note to ask about it. If you don't hear back from me, you will have a good idea of the answer.