Footwear And Us

A few years ago I was taking a round with my unit doctors. We reached labor ward. We had been repeatedly telling the all doctors and other personnel not to mix street footwear with labor ward footwear so as to minimize contamination of the labor ward. But either they would not remember it, or did not care or did not think it was right. When I found street footwear of some woman doctor (nurses have white shoes) in the labor ward, I decided to settle the issue. I asked who it belonged to, but no one would own up. I lost my patience. I picked it up, and threw it out of the window. The ward was on the ground floor, but the window was grilled. The owner would have to go out of the building and around it to retrieve the footwear. I requested the nurse on duty to tell the owner who came asking for it that I had thrown it out of the window as a disciplinary measure. The practice of carrying street footwear into the labor ward stopped for some time after that. In our temporary labor ward in the transit area, we have placed two racks in a row. The first one is for street footwear and the second one is for labor ward footwear. The instructions are not to place footwear on a rack meant for the other type. A couple of weeks ago I noticed street footwear of a woman doctor on the other rack. No one in the labor ward would own up. Since the ward is on the first floor, I did not have the heart to throw it out of the window. So I threw it behind the rack for the street footwear. The concerned person would have to search for it for some time, and that would be punishment enough, I thought. All of the doctors in my unit watched me do this, and got educated, I hoped. Apparently they did not. Today I found a fancy looking woman’s footwear on the wrong rack again, while the labor ward with my unit doctors. I picked it up and was about to throw it behind the correct rack, when my new Assistant Professor stopped me and said “Thank you.” “Is that yours?” I asked. “Yes” she said. I wonder if she thought I was being nice by picking up her footwear for her, though there was no reason for that. The direction of movement of the footwear in my hand was clearly to the back of the rack. I gave it to her and said, “The next time I find it on the wrong rack, I will take it away. It won’t fit my feet, but still I will take it away.” “Yes sir” she said. I hope she does not do it again, because I really don’t know what I will do with her footwear if I have to keep my promise and take it away.