I feel dumb

I knew the answer, but in order to make conversation with someone yesterday who’s in the same business I am, I pretended to not understand something about my job.

“Would you say this is a leaning wall or mortar deterioration? I’m still filling out the paperwork. 😅”

I just wanted to make conversation and I didn’t know what else to talk about or how to talk about it without playing games. “How’s work?” always ends quickly and tends to be boring.

“Yeah, it’s deteriorating. And these people always trying to scam and say it’s wind damage. No it isn’t, but they’ll say it because they don’t want to pay. 😒”

I didn’t want it to be a conversation complaining about people on the job or negative tones. I didn’t know how to direct the conversation to, I don’t know, complain about bricks instead. [i]Can’t we complain about bricks instead?[/i] 🥺

So I stood there awkwardly like I always do.