There’s No Such Thing as an Easy Job

by Kikuko Tsumura

I got the sense that he wasn’t a bad sort, all told. Although I was also aware that in a workplace context, people could become bad sorts as and when the situation required, so maybe it was more accurate to say he wasn’t always a bad sort.

The Black Bean Curry Koban from earlier this year had a series on the World’s Baddest Women, with the packets I examined featuring Agrippina and Bloody Mary.

Nobody’s life was untouched by loneliness; it was just a question of whether or not you were able to accept that loneliness for what it was.

Put another way, everyone was lonely, and it was up to them whether they chose to bury that loneliness through relationships with other people, and if so, of what sort of intensity and depth.

I liked this job quite a lot, but I ended up feeling unconditional respect for anybody who engaged in their work with such passion. I was all too aware that such a trait was destined to cause me a lot of hardship in my working life.

‘I’m thirty-six too,’ I blurted out, with no idea why I was confessing something like that at this juncture. Mr Sugai looked at me, tilted his head slightly and said, ‘You look younger than that.’

My job was really tough, but I’d always manage to get through the challenges it posed. And yet, I had the sense that another thing would always be following close on its heels. As soon as I’d crossed one mountain, another would appear, even higher than the first. I think to a certain extent, I’d accepted that was just the way it was,

‘I just felt like I didn’t understand a thing any more. I didn’t know what the hell I was doing, what I was living for.’

Now, it struck me that this feeling wasn’t specific to the profession that Mr Sugai and I shared. Whoever you were, there was a chance that you would end up wanting to run away from a job you had once believed in, that you would stray from the path you were on.

There are pitfalls like that everywhere, lying in wait to trip you up. The more feeling you put into your work or whatever it is you’re devoting yourself to, the more of them there are.

‘Accepting those ups and downs, choosing to take on difficult jobs – that’s what life is about. That was the conclusion I came to.’

The time had come to embrace the ups and downs again. I had no way of knowing what pitfalls might be lying in wait for me, but what I’d discovered by doing five jobs in such a short span of time was this: the same was true of everything. You never knew what was going to happen, whatever you did. You just had to give it your all, and hope for the best. Hope like anything it would turn out alright.