Here’s a slice of ill tidings and another demonstration of how fortuna hates my guts: somebody pilfered my crusty old calculator from my office workstation. If you are an employee of a financial institution, that is misfortune of Biblical proportions…much like having a limb severed. Never mind the collection of post-it pads, pens, coffee mug (which spurred a note saying: May TB ako..ibalik mo yung mug! Didn’t work.) and a pair of scissors that have been disappearing in increments over the past year.
This scenario is pathetic for two reasons:
One is that that thing is almost three years old and needs to be banged against a blunt surface for the digits to be visible on the screen. Why anyone would choose to take it now is just pitiable.
The second is that I have grown attached to it. I know, I know…Having any feelings of fondness towards an electronic device especially one that is mathematical in nature is highly uncharacteristic of me. But we have a lot of history together.
It was back in 2006. For no apparent reason, the fire alarm went off and worked our American supervisors into a frenzy. Everyone else on the otherhand (myself included) sat there looking around with an expression of amused curiosity. Pinoy culture 101: we don’t take fire alarms seriously until we smell smoke to confirm it. In the building where I live, it goes off on a regular basis and is more of an annoyance than an early warning system. Besides, we Filipinos laugh at the face of danger. Literally. Ever noticed those live news feeds from disaster areas where everybody waves at the camera?
So there I was casually fumbling with my locker keys as people were getting ushered out of the room. My apparent velleity eventually prompted my direct superior (mind you, with arms flailing in the air) to shriek, “Jane! Do you want to die over a cellphone?!” In retrospect, it was a clear violation of disaster management’s most basic principal: When confronted with a potentially dangerous situation, never use the word die if you hope to avoid inducing panic in your otherwise calm subordinate.
As one would have guessed, all I heard from her mouth was “die”. I started hyperventilating. No I did not see my entire life flash before my eyes but I started ciphering the odds of me running into a tall blue-eyed stud before biting the dust. I immediately abandoned the idea. In the confusion, I grabbed the one thing that was within range: the digital relic that is my calculator.
Nine flights down the fire exit, the 7 of us who were there realized nobody else was following. At the ground floor, we ran into the guard. After giving us a long befuddled look, he said in a monotone, “Anong ginagawa n’yo dyan?” I don’t know about you but this clearly needs to be documented as one of the cruellest false alarms in recent history. I ran down 27 flights of stairs with a calculator. How charming. And to clarify, that was not an act of dedication to my job. However, I would take it as a sign for me to rethink my priorities.
Since then it has served as a sentimental reminder of that monumental display of absurdity. Not to mention the muscular soreness that plagued my calves.
Now it’s gone. The thief has crossed the line and I’m setting booby traps!
