What Happened to Kindness?

People are mean. I work in an industry where most of the people are jackasses. Maybe it's not the industry, maybe it's the company, maybe it's people in New England... maybe it has something to do with me or my perception. Whatever it is, it seems that everyone thinks they are better and smarter than the person sitting next to them. That's especially problematic for a girl like me who has a (hopefully) irrational fear that others think I'm dumb (that's another post for another time). There is something really important and really huge missing; respect. Courtesy and respect and in general, plain kindness, seems to be something of the past. Now, more than ever, I'm sensitive to it. I feel a rumbling inside of me and I worry that the next time someone is unkind for no reason I may just unleash on them. Which, at first sounds like an excellent idea. But it wouldn't be me standing up for myself in a moment of heroism, it would be career suicide. The arrogance of my colleagues and upper management chokes me to the point where I feel like I can't breathe, at times. And rather than trying to figure out a way to brush it off, I make it worse by imagining the dialogue that would ensue if the dam broke and I was pushed to my limit. And it's ugly. It involves me mentioning the loss of my daughter in an attempt to "help" them put their life back into perspective and "help" them understand that there's nothing going on at work that would warrant their elite attitude or be as bad as what I face every single day. Then I would go on to explain that they're wasting their time trying to make me feel like shit because I couldn't possibly feel more like shit than I already do. Cheap shot on my part? Probably. Inappropriate, yes. Pathetic, perhaps? Sure. I hope it doesn't happen. I really hope it doesn't.