My Once Upon a Time Suckin Job

Years ago I had this really jerk of a boss.

If you looked up my manager, Larry Vitez in Webster's you would find that he is the definition of Weasel, in fact his company photo is at the top of the page.

I busted my butt for the company that we both worked for and every chance Larry got he would question my expense reports, deny payments and charges, take credit for accounts I opened and pass blame to me when things went sour.

One afternoon I was so pissed about my job that I left work early and on the way home I had to wait for a bus. Blocked in by this bus while traffic zoomed past me in the open left lane, as some idiot got off the bus in front of the Bojangles restaurant a few miles from my house.

Damn it, waiting there behind that bus just made me hate my job so much more. I was so angry and now a freakin bus was holding up what was left of my now free afternoon.

As the bus finally pulled away in a plume of diesel exhaust, I noticed the passenger who had to stop the bus mid block. A black man standing at the curb maybe 30 years old putting on his Bojangles shirt and visor. He struggled with the shirt as he started to walk. His walk was that of someone who had suffered with cerebral palsy all his life. The exaggerated limp and side to side rocking motion of someone you would look away from if they approached you. His one hand frozen to his chest grasped the hat, the other worked to straighten his maroon knit work shirt with the Bojangles logo.

As I drove by in my BMW I glanced in the rear view mirror as he limped along the sidewalk then up the drive and in the door. It was clearly an effort for him to walk even a short distance.

In spite of his physical handicap he was genuinely happy to be at work, smiling all the while and waving to someone who was working the drive-thru window.

I never felt sorry for myself or complained about my job again. That one encounter (my religious friends would call it a "God Smack") changed my point of view forever. I decided right there that I needed to make the best of a really bad situation and stop my bitching.

Six months later I formed my own firm which I sold two years ago for more than I ever expected. In the seventeen years since that day I am often reminded that life is not fair, and just when I think I have it bad someone else will come by and show me that my problems aren't shit!