Sorry, Puneet...

Never, ever, get too comfortable with the way things are.

Life has a funny way of catching you unawares at the most crucial of times, hitting you with the force of a sledgehammer in the face. You start to think that things are finally going your way, when all of a sudden, something you did not even consider possible happens.

Here's the story-

All was well with the universe when reached work on friday morning. It was payday, and the troubles of the past week were behind me. At about 3 PM, I was told to come for a meeting. That's when it hit me. I was getting fired. All the signs had been there from the past week, and far beyond that as well. I was just oblivious to them...The chefs meeting with the management, and her repeated statements that food cost was way too high, the quiet silences that would settle over when I was present, and the problems I chose to ignore- My minor yet frequent clashes with the sous-chef, mostly a result of misunderstanding, my crude relationship with the other pastry cook, my general incompetence and performance, and the simmering discontent that had settled in like the mist over a backwater on a cold winter morning.

As I walked into the manager's room, I was readying myself for it. He was calm, courteous and professional(how the hell else do you behave when you're firing someone?) and informed me that there were certain 'adjustment' issues, and that I was not getting along well with the rest of the crew, and in this light, he'd have to let me go. I responded by saying that I knew of the 'adjustment' issues(a synonym for "they hate my guts") and asked a few cursory questions about my pending salary and so on. Both the chefs were present in the room, eyes averted and silent, letting the manager do their talking. As I left his office, the chef muttered a characteristically dispassionate "sorry, Puneet"; and I did not even look back. I jaunted out, and took off.

Hate is the easiest emotion to cultivate. It comes from the smallest things, and compounds itself with every little flash in the pan, every disagreement and every moment of forced silence, when I wanted to holler. This hate grew in the hearts of my former colleagues, and it culminated in this event, when it boiled over onto the flame. The fact is, I was never a part of them. Surely, we both tried to get along, but we were both looking at different things, and judging our actions in a discriminatory manner. I should have realised long ago, that the same social rules that existed between them did not apply to me. I was outside the inner circle and different from them. No matter how hard these people try, most of them are hardwired with this discriminatory apparatus; and they may not even be aware of it. I don't blame them. It's just the way they are...

And Hate was the first emotion in my heart as I left the kitchens behind. I was filled with Hate, bitter and sharp. I felt betrayed and abused. As time went on, I realised that this was not going to affect any of them, and it would instead affect me. I can't hate someone for being who they are. It's their own little world, they could now do as they please, and I was free of the boulder I had placed on my heart in order to continue working at this place where I really did not want to be, but had to because it was a good job.

And what is a good job? Is it one in which you make lots of money doing something you're good at? Is it something you do for fun, money be damned? is it something you do just to earn more and more money and nothing else? or is it a little bit of everything? The definition of a 'Good Job' is very fluid, a job can be the best thing in your life for a week, and then become a form of voluntary mental torture that you choose to endure because you're still employed(and thus comfortable) and you're proud of the work that you do.

It was because I chose to suppress my discontent, that this dismissal hurts. Voicing my issues with them could have got me fired faster, and could have resulted in lesser parting pains. But because I was too full of myself, and had my head up in the clouds, that really pissed them off. They could not stand me and I was blind to that.

A friend of mine has confessed to me on a few occasions, that when he first met me, he despised me, listing all of the aforesaid characteristics as the Raison d'etre. But all of that disappeared within the space of a month, and I had made a new friend, and I'm so grateful that he saw beyond my general brazenness and misbehaviour and connected with me.

I have realised that people like that don't come along very often, and you cannot look for that level of Camaraderie, that sort of fraternity, and that intensity of friendship in just about any person. There is a word for this sort of relationship. It's called Yaari...