It’s the waiting that can get to you. 

For seven years, he watched people arrive, become his bosses, then leave. “I trained some of them. They wouldn’t be able to sort out clients, leaving it to me. Then they would go.” He’d do the work. Someone else would take the glory. Not that he had Buddhist patience. It stung. Oh, it stung. And that’s the strange thing about patience; from the outside it looks exactly like standing still. But he stayed anyway because, “I believed Securex believed in promotion from within. I believed one day, one time, I will get another chance.” 

Then, in 2012, his turn came. 

Today, Charles is one of the people who decide where guards are deployed. He joined Securex 19 years ago as a guard. There were just over 400 guards then. Today there are six thousand, and Charles has had a hand in placing many of them. He’s one of the people who decide where guards are deployed, matching a guard to the right assignment, a tricky endeavour. “What works in a factory cannot work in hospitality. You have to know the person before you post them.” 

He’s also been building a family; a father of three girls. That’s another set of balls in the air. “Boys only need soap. Girls need budgeting. Lotions. Hairdressing.” His girls have all finished higher education, the first one is married with a child, making him a grandfather. His proudest moments aren’t anything to do with work, incidentally. “My daughters have started their lives without a loan or debt to pay. They will start their lives as people with no burden.” 

He’s unburdened himself.  

“I have 15 committed friends who would never leave me. We are so close that growing up, my daughters thought some of my friends were relatives.”  Charles can already see retirement. Coffee. Pigs. Grandchildren. Eventually we all become our fathers.”I’d like to carry on with what my dad left.” Taking care of his coffee and pigs. Doting on his grandchildren. 

Perhaps that’s what all that waiting was for.