The Time That Greta Almost Swept Me Away

It's a pretty quiet work day. I take a late lunch, eating quietly at my desk while I discreetly peruse my personal email. I finish up my can of iced tea, and toss it into the trash can a couple of feet away from my desk. I close my personal email and open up my work inbox to read the latest message to come in. As I am reading, Greta comes by with a dustpan and broom. She stands to my right and waits for me to acknowledge her. I do the opposite and pretend she's not even there.

"Please," she says. "To dust." And she gestures for me to get up from my desk.

I look directly at her, mutter "Jesus Christ" under my breath, and roll my chair backwards to give her room.

Greta proceeds to "sweep" the carpeting around my desk. She spends a long time making sure each fleck of dust and each little crumb gets caught in the bristles of her broom so she can guide it safely into the dustpan. She does her job diligently, and aggressively, committed to making my area dirt-free. I start thinking to myself about how I should probably start appreciating Greta - after all, she does make my work environment a safer place to be. Dirt and crumbs lead to bacteria, disease, and sometimes Herpes. And I really don't want to get Herpes at work.

I smile to myself and think, "Wow, Greta really is amazing. She cares!" I decide to express my thanks - but just as I am about to say my thank-yous, Greta stops what she is doing. She turns around to look at me, and says, "Please - to move! To clean!" She gestures at me to move back even further from my desk.

All of my gratitude quickly flies out the window. Greta almost had me fooled. She almost had me second-guessing myself this whole time. I always thought that she was an evil cleaning lady, who makes it her mission to sabotage my work flow, my workspace, and my damn apples. Today I thought Greta might be different.

But, no, Greta is the evil cleaning lady I always thought she was.

I roll my chair backwards, allow her to smugly sweep up more of my granola mess, finish up, and walk away.

I roll my eyes, slide back towards my desk, and blog.