Friday, November 20, 2009

Phoblog #5 - Beautiful Fridays

It was the most beautiful sunset today. I couldn't resist walking up to the water, but I had to stop behind a tree. The sight was just too much. Everything was just the perfect shade of brown, my perfect shade of brown, and the brightest golden yellow. The sun wasn't just a disk in the sky; it was taking up the whole of my line of view, and it was radiating a quiet calm. I basked hungrily on every single ray. My heart felt light, and I smiled.


I was expecting something quite unpleasant, but quite unavoidable at work today. A bit after lunch, I was tagged by our HR officer. She quietly came up to me, without the usual fuss that she does when she bears good news, or just wanted to inform the GTs behind me about something that definitely does not concern me (and get a bit of play while doing so). I caught her at the corner of my eye, at the end of our aisle. She looked somber, serious. I thought to myself, "This is it."

She came up to me, touched me lightly on the shoulder. She was whispering, so I had to remove my earplug to hear what I was dreading to hear. "Bago ka umuwi, daanan mo ako, ha?" I grit my teeth. But I was ready.

At the end of my shift, I had to stay by the sink in the rest room for a while. I needed to brace myself. I came to her cubicle, where she was making a call. She still looked somber. She knew the business at hand, and there was nothing to smile about what she had to say. She took a few leaves of printed paper, no doubt bearing my name, my sentence, and the names of those who brought the mallet down. I cannot blame them though. It is by my own aversion to anything rigid that led me to this situation. There was nothing I can do than to take it, and take it hard.

"This is not a termination."
"Come again?", I thought. Holy crap. I must have misheard it. The "not" sounds highly dubious. Come on think, did she really say it?

"Wow. That's a surprise. What sort of strings did you pull to pull this off?" I sat down as gently as I can, but my knees went weak. I was looking at the paper in front of me, but I barely read anything. All I know is that it listed every single one of my transgressions without fail, and it was quite appropriately headed, "Last Ultimatum", CC'd and BCC'd to my bosses. Usually, I'd joke about how redundant "Last" and "Ultimatum" sounded (they both mean the same--the end of my stressful but relatively comfortable career), but mad respects to the woman who wrote it, so I will refrain from doing so. Plus, she was my guardian angel today, so I have to be extra nice to her from now on. :)

Suffice to say I got through that gnarly business. She was somber no longer.

------------------------

It was the most beautiful sunset today.
I closed my eyes, and basked on the glow.
I smiled.

No comments:

Post a Comment