Brothers In Cleaning

I won’t lie to you – my first few working days in the cleaning company were a real nightmare. It was like I was moving from a comfortable flat in Soho to an Indian igloo in Northern Canada. Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying than someone treated me bad or something. I was just used to a different way of life.

The first shock for me was when my brother and I went to the company office that morning. Before I used to dress with expensive tailor-made suits and now I had to wear working overalls. My morning used to start with stock index review and a cup of fine coffee and now it had to start with cleaning instruction and a schedule checking to find out where I have to clean.

I was ready to go home at the beginning, but I did not do it because of my brother. He knew what I intend to do, so he stood right next to me and his grey eyes followed me strictly. I didn’t pack up not because of his eyes, neither because I was afraid to lose this job. I stayed because I felt awkward… Let me explain it to you in details…

My brother has always been the blacksheep in our family. He was always a rebel. In school he always organised some protests, he had a long hair, he smoked, he often had fights, he was not the best student either. He did not care about what our parents said to him. He was just always going against the tide. Finally we all thought he damned his life – after all he was working as a cleaner, and we all had a certain public status.

And I on the other hand was everyone’s favourite. Not that I was that perfect. I just had an acceptable behaviour and considered well what to do and where to do it. It is amazing how far you can go being a hypocrite. My relatives praised me, women liked me. I graduated collage and started work in a prestige bank.

And now, when my life roll-over I felt that faint is making me walk in my brother’s shoes. May be it had to be some kind of catharsis for me. I should have to feel how hard it was to him and how we all undervalued him and did not support him enough. I should take a lesson. I should praise his work better.

And may be after a week or two my karma would find a way to arrange things in my life in a better way. This would be also a chance to get closer to my brother the way we’ve never been before.