It was one of those normal Saturdays in January when you get up at normal weekday time and realize that it is a weekend and desperately try to go back to sleep and then you wake up at about 9:00 am and decide to sleep for 20 more minutes and then wake up at about 12:00 noon and realize that one has completely wasted one day of the weekend. So Saturday was proceeding in this normal manner when at about 9:15 I remembered that I need to take my car to jiffy lube for the oil change. So with a sense of purpose I got up and as I was winding up my chores, I remembered that library book was also due. One of the Somerset Maugham’s book was still pending. Almost 40 pages were remaining for that one. It was supposed to be a long day with lot of small-small commitments so I thot of returning the half read book. On reaching JL, the attendant over there told me that there is going to be bit of wait time and I decided to spend the wait-time finishing of the Maugham story .
And so I started reading the book, it was a normal Maugham story about a person A, a good fellow who takes pleasure in helping fellow human beings. This A goes and helps his friend B come up in life and then this B goes and gets into an affair with A’s wife and while everything is going hunky-dory with A completely unaware , B dies in a accident, and when A’s wife tells A about her affair with B , A beats her up and goes to a senior fellow C and ask for C’s opinion on how to deal with his wife , his condition and how can people be so self-centered while dealing with somebody who has always helped them. And C says what all times are u online ? .. well no …this was one of the message which I had sent to one of my friends on yahoo messenger and this is a copy pasting mistake .. more of a slip of hand/fingers .. So coming back to A & C, what C says is One mustn’t expect gratitude. It’s a thing that no one has right to. After all, you do good because it gives you pleasure. It’s the purest form of happiness there is. To expect thanks for it is really asking too much. If you get it well , well , it’s like a bonus on the shares on which you have already received the dividend; it’s grand, but you mustn’t look upon as your due
And I was shocked. Infact I would say the impact of the words bowled me out completely. The blow was so hard that I had to let go the book. I kept the book on the chair on which I was sitting. I observed other people looking at me with an odd eye. Probably they had observed the incredulity on my face. I knew I had to get away. And so I went out. Stood in the winter cold and absorbed the significance of the sentence I had just read. And as the winter chill took hold of me I remembered all the times when somebody with whom I had been good, I had felt that my goodliness was not reciprocated. Yes ! I had felt the pain and I had resolved to correct myself, by not allowing SUCH people a chance to inflict such pain on me again. It was selfish of me and might have alienated some of my friends. But then that impulsive, selfish reaction was what that defined the real me.
The rest of the day went about me being a Samaritan, helping out people , giving out advices and in general bringing sunshine into days made bleary by the January winter. Then in the evening, while I was walking toward my house completely determined not to expect any good out of all the good things I had done throughout the day , one fellow helloed me . He was balancing a pizza-box on his hand. He wanted to enter one of the blocks of the apartment complex and he being a new delivery boy was not aware of the default code for the number based locking system. And so I went ahead and typed in the default code. And the default code also didn’t work. And now that fellow’s face hung up in despair. As he started cribbing about other customers complaining about delay and blah and blah, I suggested in case he is having the customer’s phone number, he can use my cell to call up his customer. And as he ringed his customer with my cell with a big beam of smile on his face, I understood the meaning of purest happiness.
p.s -- This one was written long back in Jan-2009. Date should be 31st of Jan. Had copied it when yahoo closed the yahoo360
And so I started reading the book, it was a normal Maugham story about a person A, a good fellow who takes pleasure in helping fellow human beings. This A goes and helps his friend B come up in life and then this B goes and gets into an affair with A’s wife and while everything is going hunky-dory with A completely unaware , B dies in a accident, and when A’s wife tells A about her affair with B , A beats her up and goes to a senior fellow C and ask for C’s opinion on how to deal with his wife , his condition and how can people be so self-centered while dealing with somebody who has always helped them. And C says what all times are u online ? .. well no …this was one of the message which I had sent to one of my friends on yahoo messenger and this is a copy pasting mistake .. more of a slip of hand/fingers .. So coming back to A & C, what C says is One mustn’t expect gratitude. It’s a thing that no one has right to. After all, you do good because it gives you pleasure. It’s the purest form of happiness there is. To expect thanks for it is really asking too much. If you get it well , well , it’s like a bonus on the shares on which you have already received the dividend; it’s grand, but you mustn’t look upon as your due
And I was shocked. Infact I would say the impact of the words bowled me out completely. The blow was so hard that I had to let go the book. I kept the book on the chair on which I was sitting. I observed other people looking at me with an odd eye. Probably they had observed the incredulity on my face. I knew I had to get away. And so I went out. Stood in the winter cold and absorbed the significance of the sentence I had just read. And as the winter chill took hold of me I remembered all the times when somebody with whom I had been good, I had felt that my goodliness was not reciprocated. Yes ! I had felt the pain and I had resolved to correct myself, by not allowing SUCH people a chance to inflict such pain on me again. It was selfish of me and might have alienated some of my friends. But then that impulsive, selfish reaction was what that defined the real me.
The rest of the day went about me being a Samaritan, helping out people , giving out advices and in general bringing sunshine into days made bleary by the January winter. Then in the evening, while I was walking toward my house completely determined not to expect any good out of all the good things I had done throughout the day , one fellow helloed me . He was balancing a pizza-box on his hand. He wanted to enter one of the blocks of the apartment complex and he being a new delivery boy was not aware of the default code for the number based locking system. And so I went ahead and typed in the default code. And the default code also didn’t work. And now that fellow’s face hung up in despair. As he started cribbing about other customers complaining about delay and blah and blah, I suggested in case he is having the customer’s phone number, he can use my cell to call up his customer. And as he ringed his customer with my cell with a big beam of smile on his face, I understood the meaning of purest happiness.
p.s -- This one was written long back in Jan-2009. Date should be 31st of Jan. Had copied it when yahoo closed the yahoo360
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