The Director Known as “Mr. Sigh”
A typical day for that director begins with a sigh and ends with a sigh.
When I say, “Good morning!” I get a gloomy reply mixed with a sigh: “Ugh… Here we go again.” They attend the morning meeting reluctantly, sighing all the while.
Above all, the part that caused me the most stress was when I had to prepare documents.
My desk was across from the director’s, and he let out a sigh about once every 30 seconds. To top it off, he’d do so while venting his frustrations.
"Why does this always happen to me? Ugh..."
"This isn't really my job, is it? Sigh..."
"It's Saturday today. Sigh..."
When he made his latest complaint, I almost snapped back, “You’ve been in the industry for a long time—it’s about time you got used to it,” but given my position, I held my tongue.
I let out a sigh during a complaint call, and the other person flew into a rage.
I was in charge of the patrol duties at that site.
We conducted regular patrols at the start of the workday, at 10:00 a.m., at 3:00 p.m., and at the end of the workday, and those times were my only chance to take a breather.
When I arrived at the site, the friendly workers cheerfully struck up a conversation with me. ”How’s ”Sighing Uncle’ (the site manager) in the mood today?” they asked, sharing jokes while showing concern for me.
So, with all that going on, I was somehow getting by day by day, but,One day, an incident occurred.。
While working at a desk in the field office, the office manager’s cell phone rang. The caller’s voice could be faintly heard coming from the speaker. It seemed to be a complaint.
"When the dump truck is driving by, the road gets dirty, so please clean it up."
Although the branch manager had initially responded calmly to the complaint, he couldn't help but let out a sigh over the phone—a habit of his.
When the person on the other end of the line heard that, they flew into a rage and stormed into the on-site office, yelling.
I had reached my limit and ended up arguing with the director
The director getting yelled at right in front of me.
Even while being yelled at, he couldn't stop letting out his habitual "Haa~" sighs. It was such an inexplicable—or perhaps bizarre?—sight that I found it a little amusing.
The negative remarks toward the person who had come to file a complaint escalated further, and, unbelievably, the branch manager started to fly off the handle.
"If you have time to call, why don't you clean up yourself!!!"
What a childish, petulant outburst—it’s like something an elementary schooler would do (lol).
After being forced to listen to that conversation for so long—and having held my tongue the whole time—I finally reached my limit. Before I knew it, I had blurted these words out at the director.
"If you hate your job that much and are always sighing, why don't you just find a new one? At the very least, your comments are making the people you work with feel negative too, so could you please stop saying things like that? It's a nuisance."
The one who saved me from the angry director was…
As expected, the director, having been told something like this by me—someone younger than him—started snapping at me, too.
"Do you even know what the director's going through? Huh?"
As I stood there frozen, unable to respond, an employee from a partner company who had been watching stepped in to mediate and reached out to help me.
"This young person listened to your sighs and complaints day in and day out, yet never said a word and always stayed cheerful on the job. Isn't it part of your job as the branch manager to create a work environment where everyone can work comfortably together?"
With those words, I felt all the stress I’d been carrying melt away. The director seemed at a loss for words; he just muttered, “I’ll reflect on this,” and that was the end of the matter.
It’s been five years since then. I recently had a reason to visit that director’s worksite for the first time in a long while.
As always, she let out a sigh—"Haah~"—but afterward, she had enough composure to joke to herself, "Oh, there goes that bad habit of mine." Now, the two of us can laugh about that incident together.
The words that a representative from our partner company said to me back then still give me strength to this day.
