The Test of True Character

One very important lesson I’ve learnt in my years of living is to treat everyone with respect regardless of who they are. I wouldn’t count myself as a disrespectful individual because even in situations where I am supposed to disrespect someone, I hold back. Because really, there’s no use doing that in the first place.

I grew up in a home where respect was a value we all made sure to hold on to. As they say, respect is reciprocal. Once you respect yourself enough to respect others, they would without doubt also give you that same respect because you deserve. Today,something very funny happened that got be thinking about if some of the things we do are even necessary.

For as long as I can remember,I’ve always had my peace of mind in the space I’m currently renting. I don’t disturb others and they also don’t disturb me. We all live in peace and harmony. Then one day,new tenants show up in the house and I no longer had my peace of mind. This man and his family moved into our house for some months now and before they came, my landlord gave him my contact to call me when they move in to talk about our electricity bill.

I wasn’t sharing electricity bills with anyone before they came but their meter had an enough which made the landlord connect them with mine. Which meant that we all had to contribute to buy power. When the arrived, I had already bought power which we used for about two weeks. Then I met him and asked that we contribute to buy power.

Before this man gave out his share of the money , I was already frustrated because it took a lot of talking and explanation. The next time we were to contribute, this man flat out told me he won’t pay because per his view, the power was finishing faster than it should which was a lie. With our daily consumption, it made sense. He refused to pay and I had to use my own money to buy power for us all to use.

This continued for so long and this man never made an effort to pay his part. He even owed me but I was okay with him not paying. Then I got fed up and decided not to buy power. Ladies and gentlemen, we slept in darkness for a full week. I had to go back and buy it because it was then I knew this man had no shame. A week later, I got the Landord to disconnect me from them so they keep the meter because this was daylight robbery. We did that and everyone was good to go.

This man wasn’t letting it go, he went back a few days later to accuse the landlord of keeping me on their meter and I’m using their power. When I heard about it , I was so angry because what kind of disrespect is this. To call an older person a lair and even call me a thief, indirectly. Since that incident, I made a mental not to not associate with people like this.

He knew he had wronged me, but we lived in the same house and didn’t even greet each other because of this. It’s been months now. Today, he decided to come up to me and apologise. In my head, I laughed because I knew he had been living with guilt all these months. He probably thought he could cheat me because I looked small but to go to the extent of trying to make things look like I was cheating you is crazy. But hey, everyone is different in his own way I guess.

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all images belong to me.

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