When people get frustrated with each other’s lack of knowledge, it’s usually differing views on what is assumed to be obvious.

Like in the pharmacy. Where the pharmacists think it’s obvious that “you have to pay for what you buy” and “we aren’t going to break rules for you”… and the patients think it’s obvious that “the emergency room prescribed me this med, therefore needing this med is an emergency, therefore this overrides all other rules that would normally apply, because if this weren’t the case, the emergency room would not have prescribed this and then told me to go get it at the pharmacy”…. while the emergency room thinks it’s obvious that the patient and the pharmacy are just automatically gonna be on the same page about everything, so they don’t need to clarify any of it to any of us.

And this sucks.

But at least it is a situation where I’m familiar with the thought process on the different sides of these assumptions… and I can usually anticipate what conflicts are gonna happen… and sometimes I can even get people to understand and listen to each other a little bit, if I’m really really lucky.

But.

In situations where I don’t know what anyone else considers obvious? Where i don’t know whether my own idea of obvious is going to look absolutely batshit to them, and they aren’t telling me, because it’s supposed to be so obvious?

….Then I’m as lost as anyone.

Like. The contractor who’s supposed to work on my front steps and my fence?  who’s been alternately ghosting my messages and scheduling dates to start work but then not showing up? For three months now? Like. Is this normal? 

I mean. He was the only one who even answered my initial queries in the first place. So it’s not like any other people in his line of work around here are any better at communication than him. 

But, is that because my timeframe of needing this done by winter was completely unrealistic to start in July? and he’s just stringing me along without telling me that, because it’s so stupidly obvious that I’m 1000% at fault if I don’t already know it? 

Like. I think that would be a dick move. 

But that doesn’t mean I can expect it not to happen. or to have any recourse if it does happen.

 (Source: my extensive observations of a similar dick move being done to pharmacy patients, all the damn time.)