While the speaker made a complaint, there was another “I” who heard the complaint.
This “I” was, usually, or could be, a close friend or family.
However, the Emotional Worker or Counter Staff was the first person – who picked up the phone and answered or provided the basic requirements and guided the procedure and this could have been their first encounter.
This “I” is in charge and makes them fill the formula, asks them to wait till next week or next month, and delivers the papers to the committee.
I (the counter staff, the emotional worker) had the duty of encoding or numbering the REAL COMPLAINT into JUST LETTERS and categorizing these complaints according to a given method.
In this numbered paper, there was no FACE, VOICE, EMOTION or indication that ‘I’ was heard.
I felt that they gasped for breath when they were angry and devastated. But when the complaints were delivered to the superiors, they could only see the well-ordered words. There was no reality. Thus, at some point, whenever I encountered THE SPEAKER, I pretended that I couldn’t hear-see-feel their complaints.
This is my confession which I regret making rather late in time. I worked for many years as counter staff and I still remember passing the speaker by with an empty look. These memories struck me vividly while I read this book.