I used to have a file on my desk with the label “F-Ups”.
I never intended that it would become the subject of any controversy when I named it. In fact, it was only when a board member asked me how many times I planned to “f@ck up”, that I saw the humorous side. Before then, I diligently kept all documents that needed following up neatly inside it.
I jumped in my car and went to have my nails done. On my way there, I was getting pissed off that I was stuck in traffic. It was 11am on a Tuesday morning and there was no reason for the stupid road in front of my office block to have had any issues.
When I eventually got to the end of the queue, I saw that there had been an accident. There was a blonde lady standing outside her 4×4. She was on the phone and was crying.
There was also a crowd gathering around someone sitting on the floor behind her vehicle. There was no second car and I wondered what the blonde tart was crying about. The traffic light went green and it was my turn to go.
I had called the salon to say that I was running late. As I arrived and was running up the stairs, I looked back. I could see the crowd around the person sitting on the floor growing bigger and bigger.
When I got into the nail bar, the receptionist told me that the therapist was running late. I was a little annoyed. For God’s sakes, I thought, could you not have told me this when I called you to say I was running late?
I sat down and took out my Blackberry. Yes, a Blackberry. I thought I would use the time to check my emails.
The first email I saw was from a colleague from another division. She was a known chaos-sower and we rarely had to interact, thank God. Her email said that the CEO was urgently looking for a document, which she knew that I had kept a copy of. So, she went to my desk and helped herself to a file which she thought may contain the document. It was the F-Up file. She made it seem as though she was “helping” me. You know? Doing the work for me in my absence, so that the boss would not find out that I was using “company time” for my private shit. Yeah right!? I worked flexi hours, dumb thing.
The nail technician did not turn up for work that day. She had been the one sitting on the floor and the blonde tart had reverse crashed into her while she was walking to work. It was the last time she was able to walk.
I got back to my office and the tension was thick. The F-Up file had been taken apart and my friend at reception whispered “She’s such a b2tch!”
The unpaid bills that were the subject of the commotion in the office had in fact been paid long ago. I kept the copies in the F-Up file to remind me to change the address when we moved offices in months’ time. If the chaos-sower had taken the time to look at the back on the document, the whole saga could well have been avoided.
I thought about the blonde tart. I sent her love across the walls of my office block and down the main road. I thought that perhaps a lot of f@ck ups could well be avoided if we took the time to look back.
But, I figured, that most times we’re so focussed on what’s on/in the front, that nothing else really matters.
© A Heart Full of Stories, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Lee Mayimele - Writer 