Stuffing

Perception

There is a guy at work who I seem to have had a very wrong perception of. I don't know if I can adequately put this into words, but I think I must have made assumptions based on how he looks and acts that were completely wrong. Sometimes it's a shock to be wrong. But good, because it makes you look at the world differently.
Anyway, here is what I saw - I saw him as a nice guy, gruff with people, very independant, doing things his way when he disagreed with the process of the dept. But very helpful when you got past the gruff exterior. He is overweight and I knew he had health problems. I guessed that if he had children, they were probably teenagers. He seemed much older than I (and he may be, I have no idea on that). I have never had a personal conversation with him - we always talked about computer stuff.
But anyway, the other day the secretary sent out the link for his blog. And honestly, I would NEVER have guessed they were the same guy. He's a Christian, he writes very tenderly (as a pose to the gruff exterior I see) and he's in China right now with his wife adopting a baby girl.
I had NO idea.
It surprised me because I thought I was pretty perceptive- I don't think that now.
Surface conversations can frustrate me because I can't see how to get to a deeper level. I'm not a great conversationalist.
I am looking at things differently today.

posted by Aphra @ 8/18/2007 11:46:00 AM