The girl who wont give up...

It took all the strength I had not to fall apart,
And tryin' hard to mend the pieces of my broken heart.
And I spent oh so many nights just feelin' sorry for myself, I used to cry
But now I hold my head up high...

Gloria Gaynor - "I'll survive"

Sometime last year, I got to know 'A' through a friend of mine... She was out of work and wanted to get into a job very badly, had extensive experience in event management. My friend had asked her to talk to me and see if I could help her in finding a suitable opportunity as I was into HR consulting. After a few minutes into the discussion I realized that I could not help her much because my business focus is only the IT industry. I, in turn, asked her to talk to my friend who is in Public Relations and Media Management for help. Nothing came of it because she did not want to get into an agency job again... Every time an ad appeared in the papers for a management position, she would call me to find out if it would be a good idea to apply as she was confused and did not know what to do AND I was a HR consultant wasn't I? So I should know...
Then one day she called me and said she got an offer from an event management company and asked if she should take it. I said, "Yeah, join up and keep looking for other opportunities, better to grab the chance you have."

We kept in touch. I regretted many times my suggestion on taking that offer, because she stopped being serious about other opportunities, being loyal, ethical and not being able to leave projects mid-way... Working till mid-night, driving long distances to meet clients and organize events, working on weekends, working even while she was having serious health troubles and not getting her salary on time...

The more I get to know her, the more I am amazed by her resilience and the will to live... A deeply religious girl, she is often offended by my jokes on religious figures... She had been in an accident that broke her legs badly, so much that she had to undergo a series of surgeries; the last one was incomplete because she stopped breathing on the operating table... The doctors wrote off her ability to walk, run and dance again... but after two years of being bedridden, she learnt doing that all over again... She wanted to learn to play squash despite doctors warning that very rigorous activity might hurt very badly leaving her disabled for life...

And last sunday when she took her dog for a walk and it was attacked by another dog, she ran to seperate them, twisted her leg breaking it again in the same place it was damaged before... In terrible pain, with a swollen knee that refuses to bend and has rendered her unable to walk, she may have to undergo the same series of surgeries as the first time [ I hope it wont be required. ] She still wants to learn to play squash... Eventually she will.