Part I: Despondent

He was despondent.

He had argued with his work colleague. Just thinking about it made him tired. He didn't have the energy to visualise the confrontation.

Why bother?

Running it through his head would just make him get all worked up again about nothing.

Actually, he was wrong. That was the point of it. He had lost his cool over the exact same thing. That was the problem. It was the same thing. Over and over again.

How long had it been? 15 years? 15 years!

Is 15 years a long time? It is all a blur. You wake up at the same time, you trundle along the same route, in the same car, to the same workplace, to the same desk, to do the same job.

Only the technology changes. The people too.

That was it. Watching a new employee make the same mistakes that the previous new employee made the last time.

The mistakes happen because the company didn't want to invest in the new program that would eliminate the mistake happening in the first place.

Here he was. Trying to help the new employee fix that mistake. But, she didn't want to listen. She was adamant that she didn't make a mistake. Even though she agrees that there was a mistake. It wasn't her fault. Ok, ok, he just wanted to avoid this circular conversation. So, he explained again that she do, this step, this way, and then this mistake won't happen... and that should have been that.

Ah, he was tired. He could feel the weight of gravity upon him. Like a South American mule carrying a load upon its back, up a mountain, during a monsoon.

Does South America have monsoons? Ah, he didn't feel intelligent anymore. He was tired.

After lunch, at his desk, he was just sitting there, processing some orders into the system. It was easy to daydream while doing data entry. The system was old and couldn't keep up with his inputting speed. He was a veteran. He knew all of the codes, especially, the older infrequent ones. It was his gift. 100% accuracy and never a day missed. Even when his father died, he was back at work by lunchtime and made up the morning hours by the week's end. He was a solid employee. Dependable.

His daydream had been interupted by the new employee that he had had the little mistake discussion with. It took alot of energy, and a refocus of his eyes, to lift his head to look up at her, standing with her hand on her hip, she was focused, and he knew that she had something, somerhing she had spent some energy in her brain, to tell him.

In a threat, somewhat veiled, she expressed her dislike of how he had spoken to her. She had been contemplating on taking the matter to Human Resources.

Wow, he thought. He asked her what it was that he had said that was offensive.

He recalled to himself the first boss he had ever had, a grumpy Englishman with a thick accent, so thick, that was hard to understand. He used to say to his boss, "Good morning!" and his boss would always reply back, "What's so fookken good aboot it?"
One time when he had complained to his boss about a difficult task at hand, his boss motivated him by yelling, "If you don't fooken like it, you weak coont, then fook oof!"

It wasn't what he had said, she almost spat at him with her words, she didn't like his facial expression, when he had said it.

How his face had looked? Had he looked angry? No. It had looked annoyed. Annoyed! He had been annoyed.

Oh, now he had to know how his face was looking? He always avoided looking at himself in the mirror or in photos. He didn't like the look of the person that looked back. That guy was unhappy.

So, he had apologised. She had just stood there for another minute. He guessed she was making a point. What point? Maybe it was an equality thing? Maybe she didn't want to be seen as the new person anymore. Maybe she figured he was an easy target. She would not have done it to anyone else in the company. Most other people would have let her drown in her mistake. But it was wrong not to help fix a mistake in his way of thinking.

What did it matter? There was a mistake, he had found it, helped a work colleague, and trained them. Mission accomplished. All was back to normal.

Normal. That monotonous grind that he used to enjoy. But not anymore. That little thrill of inputting all of the orders. The delight in working with his colleagues, sharing the office humour and gossip. Where had the spark gone?

The 2 small vibrations from his pocket notifying him of a message on his phone.

Oh, a Whatsapp message, from his almost ex-wife.

For someone lacking technogical ability, a group of mother's had worked out the benefits of chatting applications. There was a time when only a few used the clandestine chatting apps.

She was in the carpark, standing beside my car, and I had to go out to talk with her.

He knew he should have responded to her message this morning, and the missed phone call, he guessed, a marriage never really ends when there are children involved.

He powered down his computer, gave a couple of friends a high five, or mandatory obscene gesture, and heading towards the car park.

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Part 2: That Face