The difference between Lying and being Incorrect;
The habit of humans to gang up on weakness and strangle it for the pure joy of being a winner;
Having to figure out how to report something you did after finding out you didn't do it correctly... and Ladders.
This will not be a happy journal.

---

Let me start by saying this:

Everybody loves to catch a liar.

They love catching liars so much, they'll even to go so far as to take it upon themselves to manufacture his lies for him.

...AND HAVE NO IDEA THEY DID IT.

Have you ever had a situation where a bunch of people have sworn on their lives about a fact of something you did that you have not the foggies clue of? It's very disorienting; it makes you doubt a lot of things. Your own sanity--not in the fun cackling maniacally way but in the debilitating impaired function way. The way that makes you starve to death on a street corner. I'm beginning to wonder if it's just crowd mentality hive-mind mutual-mass-hypnosis or something, and it only serves to frighten me -more- that I in fact would rather believe it that way.

I'm trying my best to look at my life, right now, and this very specific situation which I will describe shortly, impartially and from the perspective of an external observer. Namely, the perspectives of the others involved, and to run a 'thought expirement' on what life would be like if it were entirely true.

So, here it goes.
The mall has six roof hatches. Each is up a 20 foot or so ladder and each must be locked by padlock. There was a contractor which had recently used these roof access points in the past day or so, but the person who was writing down the necessary information on which hatch needed to be accessed. So we didn't know. My supervisor told me to check them to see if they are locked. I went to each one, looked up, saw what I THOUGHT was the padlock, and reported "they all appear to be secure." They questioned more specifics and I said, "When I observed, it looked like they were locked." When they asked me if I was sure, I quoted the textbook. "Due to liability reasons, we are not allowed to state unequivically that any access-limiting system is functioning perfectly." or something along those lines, basically 'you know none of us can say that, especially over the radio.'

That was only part of the setup. The next part was the prior events. Sorry to hop around in the timeline. Earlier that day, I asked "Am I to go to mobile patrol?" And Mr. Supervisor said, "Wait until we know exactly who is on the shift this evening." So I waited until we verified who was on the clock, and then went to the security vehicle and commenced mobile patrol.
Oops.
Two hours later, I get called in and he says, "I never told you to go out into mobile. I told you to Wait." --and the fact that the CONDITION that defined the hold was negated had apparantly nothing to do with anything AFTER ALL! And this means that I was being difficult when I brought it up. NO, STONEY. YOU ARE NEVER RIGHT. Fuck. I thought I learned this one already. When they say something, it doesn't matter if they're wrong; they're right because they have the authority to SAY they are, and trying to defend yourself with logic will only make them angry, because they're right, and they know best. After all, that's why THEY'RE supervisors, and YOU'RE not, Stoney.

... sorry. Back on track...

So, already, he had his eye on me today, for directly disobaying orders, I guess. That's what he called it. But he's in charge, so it must be true.

Later, I was back in mobile--this time, he ASKED me to be there, so that's good. I drove around until 9:30 pm when he said for me to come in and assist with lockdown. When I responded, the radio set in the security vehicle got feedback from the talkie handset I usually carry on my belt, so I turned the handset down and responded over the car's radio system. I got out, went in, and proceeded to lock down West Court.

Halfway through lockdown of west court, My supervisor bursts out of Lower Corridor #1, yanks my radio off my belt, cranks the volume up--YES. THERE IT IS! I forgot to turn the volume back up! OH BOY! And then he shoves it into my shoulder and tells me I LIED about checking the roof hatches because two of them were unlocked! So he shoos me off to get the hell up to GNC Entrance to give the Mall Manager a ride to her car, that she's been waiting for WAY too long.

so... lets seee....
1) I went to mobile without being explicitly told I'm supposed to.
2) I was wrong about the roof hatches (but wait there's more--! I'll tell you in a bit.)
3) My radio was turned down to nil volume when he found me.

See, up until that point, my day was going just fine and dandy. I was closing the mall, I was home free; I was about to put the day to rest with satisfaction, go home, and resign my consciousness to oblivion for maybe a dozen hours. It just wasn't meant to be, I guess.

Alright. AGAIN re-tracking...

He tells me that three witnesses AND customer service heard me over the radio saying that I saw the padlock's bar intersecting both loops of all latches concerned. And that's what puzzles me. I specifically did NOT say that. And that's what irks me. I've got three people telling me I did something that I didn't do, and somehow this one small, mostly innocuous act on its own, becomes the cornerstone to a monument of tragic error... and it's a cornerstone that's not even REAL.

He confonted me several times in the security office last night with his little posse of lairs telling me something I didn't say. All of them nodding like bobbleheads as he led them, shepherd and sheep. It is the general consensus of the majority that IS, by definition, Sane, that I am the liar though. But he told me again and again that I LIED about what I saw. As if doing so would convince me. I looked him straight in the eye, and I actually said something I'm kind of proud of. I said: "I will not argue with you over a subjective, individual opinion. I am sorry that I was wrong, but you are not going to tell me what I believed." Calm. Quiet. I didn't think I had it in me.

But hindsight is twenty-twenty. If I actually climbed up there in the first place, I would've realized that no, they WEREN'T locked, and I would've locked them, just as I ended up doing.

I -WAS- at fault, I -AM- at fault, but I am NOT a liar. Yes, the check I performed on the roof hatches was unsatisfactory. I lapsed in judgement when I saw the square, blocky geometry of part of the latching system and assumed it was the padlock, right where it was supposed to be. I lapsed in judgement when I looked up there, figured it was the padlock, and didn't consider climbing all the way up and making sure. Oh sure, I could come up with an excuse that I didn't want to risk breaking my neck six times over, but last night I had to climb up to both of the two hatches I mistook and lock them. Clinging to a straight rigid vertical rungs while trying to fumble a fat, heavy padlock in your hands and work the keys into it... it's kind of creepy, you know?

But now, I have shed every last shred of honor I had in that place, and they're not going to give me the time of day when I show up for my scheduled shift today. I'm going to lose my job. They're going to fire me. And, somehow, I'm kind of hoping they'll at least make it quick and get it over with. Some part of me almost wants to hope that I -do- get fired just so I won't have to put up with seeing any of them ever again. There has always been some kind of guiding force about my job, sticking a thorn into my side whenever I got too complacent. I didn't come to roanoke to work mall security after all, y'know.

... and I've been awake till now because I couldn't sleep. Too much worry.
... go figure.