Lessons that I needed to learn!

For last one week, on every single day my boss used to give me additional job that made me stay up till 8 O’ clock in the office. I had given my time to my girlfriend that week but was not being able to spend any time in the evening with her. She was terribly upset with me for that. She thought that I was making excuses to avoid her.

Sometimes, I felt really angry at my boss. But I could not do anything. I slogged my ass off till late in the evening whereas he left from the office at 5 O’ clock sharp. He got extra time to spend with his family whereas I was being stopped from even starting a family. “How cruel life is!” I mumbled in my mind.

When I talked with my girlfriend in the night after going from office she gave me an ultimatum. “Either we are meeting tomorrow or we don’t meet again ever,” she blared like a lioness.

Next day, I implored to my boss for releasing my early, but he told that I was the future Sr. Manager of the purchase department and if I would show such irreverence to the hard work then my future prospects might hamper. I knew he was blackmailing me. But, I needed the job badly.

My boss again left the office at right time. And I was alone in the office to ruin my love life and create my future. I felt like breaking my head. My girlfriend just hung up on my call as I told her that I wouldn't be able to go in the evening together.

I knew that my girlfriend was furious but I couldn't do anything.  I decided that day that I would leave this job. “Job is there to facilitate life not to ruin it,” I convinced myself.

I decided that next day I would convey my decision to leave the company to my boss. Next day, when I tried to go to my boss’s chamber, his secretary informed me that he had taken leave for that day. I thought of informing him through sms but then changed my mind. A face to face conversation is always better in such circumstances.

I thought of telling him the next day. But next day again he was on leave. Three days of the leave passed by. My girlfriend wanted me to quit the job as soon as possible. She had sent my CV in her company and they were also interested in me. But the problem was that I was not being able to contact my boss.

On the next Sunday, finally I got some time to spend with my girlfriend. My girlfriend was again complaining that I was making excuses and not telling my boss about my leaving of the job, she also told that I was not man enough to tell my boss that I was leaving because of his tyrant work hours imposed on me. As I was driving my bike to a restaurant to calm down my girlfriend’s anger with some good continental cuisine, I spotted the car of my boss parked outside a stadium.

I stopped my bike and told my girlfriend, “Come along with me, I will tell my boss about my resignation before you.”

“But how will you find him in this crowd of the stadium?”

“I am a man, I can find him out,” I told her with a manly pride.

As I entered the stadium, I found that there was an athletic meet of schools going on. My eyes scanned for the face of my boss. After searching him for twenty odd seconds, I found him out.

“Follow me!” I ordered my girlfriend.

As I inched closer to him, I saw a young girl of ten coming close to him. He made her sit and sprayed her left leg with an analgesic bottle. He moved to the right leg of the girl and unwrapped the straps of the prosthetic leg that she was wearing and put powder on the stump knee. In a few minutes the girl was ready to run. She went in the line for the race of 100 meters. 

We were watching all this from a distance.

My boss was backing her up with all the encouraging words possible. She came second in the race. And my god, my boss seemed to be on the seventh haven.  The girl came and hugged him.

My girlfriend and I kept looking at the whole scenario from a distance. We didn't say each other even a word but we understood that it must have been due to the preparations for the athletic meet of his daughter that my boss used to leave the office early. I felt ashamed that day because my boss was trying to fashion optimism in the life of his daughter but I was thinking that he was being tyrant to me. That day, my girlfriend and I knew that life is not only about being restless as lovers but patient and enthusiastic as parents in the hardest of times for their children.

That day, I came to know what it takes to be a man!

That day my girlfriend and I matured as human beings and started respecting life more than ever. After that episode, we came to know the new meaning of togetherness.