“Hello, have you had lunch?”
It was refreshing to hear that voice. A voice other than, “Doctor, can you..?”
I had to pry my head out of the stack of patient’s casenotes in front of me to see to whom it belonged to.
Her head, hung lower than mine, was peering behind her shoulder to see me. Bent down in a crouched down position, she was doing what she did for every room, room after room, hour after hour, day after day. It was the hospital cleaner, clad neatly in an iron-pressed pink and grey uniform, her hair immaculately hidden behind a muslim headscarf.
“I hope you’ve had lunch, doctor.”
I hadn’t. But it was refreshing to know someone cared.
Her name is Ida. She reminded me of Chang Yan, the lady in level 12 who invisibly sweeps, mops, cleans and dusts the four hospital wards there. Her skin is freckled and her hair is always bunned up, Chinese-style. She has a sweet mainland China accent. She was always smiling at me, always grateful whenever I had some extra food to share with her.
Our hospital cleaners. The invisible people who move in and out of our clinics and wards, sweeping and mopping, making sure the dirt and chaos we leave behind dissolve into traceless ambiguity.
This season, I’ve been reflecting about my attitude at work. It is scary, when one stops to look at where one is, when one realizes how far one has gone away from the shore. A few days ago, during a meetup with a colleague at lunch, it struck me hard as to how much our work can abrade our hearts, leaving its surface keratinized, hard, and old. He used to be so full of life, so full of compassion. During my tearful Orthopaedic posting, he once bought me food and a carebear keychain to make me smile. Once, I found him at the hospital “Mr Bean” stall buying icecream in a cup and running up to the ward because “my patient has stage 4 cancer and she said she just wanted to taste icecream today. I hope it doesn’t melt too much, gotta run!” But that day when we met, he was cold, cynical, giving his opinion on politics in his department. How are you, I asked him. But his eyes never quite met mine long enough for me to see into them. I’m okay, he said, just tired. It’s tiring, he said.
So it is. And perhaps, it is the insidiousness of the monotony of work which erodes us the most. Day after day, human interactions bombard us and demand the best of us. But we fall short. And each time we do, every time we say a harsh word because of impatience or think an evil thought about another or feel unjustified, we harden our hearts, and become cold, unforgiving, suspecting.
Have I become like that? Have I become resentful of the working hours? Have I started taking shortcuts? Have I dreaded being on-call for thirty hours?
Gossip, complaints, unfairness, conflict… all leave a scar. And scarred skin never is quite as tender as the baby-soft texture our hearts were made of.
At times, I feel my outward man perishing: I am tired, my tone is poor, I take deep breaths to withhold something I wish to say but ought not to. Yet, I remember the people like Ida, and Chang Yan, and think to myself, why do I lose heart?
They are always smiling, always joyful. Always so full of that quiet dignity even though they are bent over half the time. They never feel too small to say hi to a doctor. They never feel too invisible to just fade into the background. Once, Chang Yan told me, she works twelve hours a day, every day, six days a week. From seven to seven, she clears the bins of the hospital, bin after bin, and sweeps floor after floor, cleans room after room. Once a week, she gets a random day off. But her colleagues may not get the same day off, so it is often spent alone. For all that monotonous, soul-numbing labour, she earns a meager salary.
But she smiles. Like Ida, she always smiles. And when they do, it lights up the room like a blazing torch. No matter how stressed or busy or harangued I feel, saying hello to them and seeing their radiant, blazing smiles brings such a warmth and joy to my heart. They remind me, that one ought to take joy and dignity in one’s work. No matter what it is, one needs to honour what one does. After all, it is what one spends most of one’s time doing.
Is it fair for them to leave home before dawn and reach home after dusk every day? Is it fair for them to be treated like the lowest of the low? Is it fair for them to carry out such monotonous duties for so little? If they feel damned, they never show it.
Then why do I harbor bitterness in my heart for the same questions I ask myself. Why is there such a fierce sense of self-righteousness in me that demands “fair” treatment. Is there such a thing as fairness? Or does fairness lose its meaning in the face of joy and dignity and purpose in one’s sacrificial labour and joyful sowing. Why do I lose heart?
Ida and Chang Yan remind me, that though our outward man is perishing, yet our inward man can be renewed day by day. Though I feel this constant pressure eroding me away, I have the choice to refresh, renew and restore what is lost, day after day.
At times I feel I’m at the end of a losing battle. When patients or nurses complain, it is almost inevitably our fault. They can be rude or harsh or demanding, but those occasions merely call for a saint within us to rise to the occasion. I realize I am far from one-I get angry, and upset and discouraged, too. I say curt things and frown. I wonder if I am a good team player or leader or friend. I become bitter at the double standards. But why should I? For every pang of injustice my over-sensitive, self-righteous soul feels, Ida and Chang Yan should feel it ten times over.
But they let it go.
They smile. Through room after room, clearing bin after bin, day after day.
It is as if their physical clearing of trash in the hospital, reflects their inner state of constant cleaning, clearing and emptying. Cleaning themselves of self-pity, clearing themselves of humiliation, emptying themselves of pride.
Though they seem as if they are merely wasting their youth away, their inner souls are being nourished by humility, patience, and dignity.
And so perhaps, I wonder if I should take a lesson on cleaning, to clean, clear and empty myself of the junk, trash and dirt that I’ve allowed to accummulate within me for the past many months.
I have much to learn. And much to feel grateful for.
On thirty-hour call again tomorrow.
And cleaning, clearing and emptying.
“Therefore we do not lose heart.
Even though our outward man is perishing,
yet the inward man is being renewed day by day.
For our light afflication, which is but for a moment,
is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.”
– 2 Cor 4:16