Chin up and smile

For the majority of us work is a necessary evil, however it always helps when we are in a vocation that we enjoy. I think I am fortunate in that I do enjoy my work. Despite this we all have good days and bad days and on some of those 'not so pleasurable' days, it is sometimes difficult to answer in a positive way when we are asked by our loving partners "How was your day today".

It was with this in mind that I read an article recently about a diver in Mexico City who spends his working hours swimming and diving through the sewers of the city clearing the blockages. For the last 30 years he has been maintaining the 7,500 miles of pipes and tunnels, spending between 30 minutes and six hours at a time submerged in their depths, with just an airtight suit for protection against the human, animal and chemical waste and the associated stench.

I don't know what sort of a man Julio Cu Camara is, and I don't know if he actually enjoys what he does, but I do know that when I think I have had a 'crap day' I should be ashamed of myself. No matter how bad my day has been, it really hasn't been that bad. I haven't gone out each day to be faced with unknown people trying to kill me, I haven't left home not knowing if I will return again, I haven't walked out my front door knowing that I will be required to submerge myself in someone else's excrement, and that I will be required to do it again tomorrow as well. We spend a lot of time complaining, but is our situation really as bad as we think?

At the moment we seem to be spending a lot of time complaining about the weather. Over the last few days the front page of every newspaper, and the headline act on every news channel has been caught up in the weather gloom. 'Winter weather greets the first day of spring', 'Freezing Britain braced for more winter weather in coldest March for 50 years', 'Snow and floods cause widespread disruption across the UK'.

It may be a bit cool, but come on guys, it isn't that bad. It's quite simple really, if you are too cold, put more clothes on, if you are too hot, take some off. Most of us also have the luxury of turning the heating up. Spare a thought for the homeless guys that you stepped over on the way to the tube this morning. Many of them don't have a choice, and when we get these cold days, it is them that suffer. Do they complain? I don't know, to my shame I have never listened, have you? It does raise the question of how far any one of us are from being in their position. Who really knows. One bad decision, one set of unfortunate circumstances, and that could be any one of us.

We are a nation that prides itself on the war time motto of 'Keep Calm and Carry On'. Does this still hold true, or has that become the seemingly more accurate 'Complain bitterly, and lets stop work to talk about it'. Lets spare a thought for Julio Cu Camara and the homeless guy that we studiously ignore every day. Chin up, smile, and lets get on with living.