you light up my life

Maeve once worked at a factory where the janitor -- a recent immigrant from Greece -- fell madly in love with her and not only sang the song You Light Up My Life for her but also bought her a packet of her favorite cigarettes in the hope that when she lit up he would become the light of her life too!

"Zorba -- or whatever his name was," laughs Maeve, "was a really sweet man but he was way out of his league expecting me to fall in love with him."

"I was the accountant at the factory and I only noticed Zorba when I went outside to have a smoke."

"Because he always seemed to be working in the vicinity of where I sat down to have a smoke," explains Maeve, "it was natural that I would acknowledge his presence."

"One day Zorba asked me to explain an English word for him -- which I gladly obliged -- and after that he always seemed to make an excuse to speak to me."

"I started to feel uncomfortable because I could see he had other things on his mind besides learning English and I was angry that the new smoking ban meant I could no longer smoke in the privacy of my own ofice."

"One day Zorba embarrassed me dreadfully by singing the song You Light Up My Life to me," sighs Maeve."I appreciate that singing to a woman may be acceptable in Greece but it's just not done around here!"

"After that I gave up smoking at work in order to avoid any more embarrassing encounters with Zorba," explains Maeve, "but then Zorba did an extraordinary thing."

"He came to my office one day and asked why I wasn't smoking any more."

"I didn't think this was any of his business and when my boss passed by -- saw Zorba in my office and gave me a look as if to say 'what the hell is the janitor doing in your office' -- I had to order the poor man to please leave my office."

"The next day I came in and on my desk was a packet of my favorite cigarettes."

"Zorba had obviously returned to my office either the evening before or early morning and left them for me -- probably hoping that I'd take up smoking at work again and spend more time with him outside."

"It worried me that Zorba might have rifled through my personal papers while he was alone in my office."

"The thought of him sitting on my chair -- reading my letters -- gazing at the photographs on my desk -- and imagining himself in my life filled me with both horror and pity."

"I liked the man -- he was very sweet," explains Maeve, "but he had gone too far."

"I showed the packet of cigarettes to my boss and he didn't need an explanation. Apparently everybody knew that Zorba was madly in love with me!"

"My boss warned me that Zorba may have spiked the cigarettes with drugs and took them from me."

"I couldn't imagine Zorba doing anything so dreadful," says Maeve, "but my boss knew the ways of men better than I did so I deferred to his judgment."

"The following day I heard that Zorba had been fired."

"I felt both relieved and guilty."

"The trouble with forcing employees to smoke outside is that women get exposed to potentially dangerous situations," says Maeve. "I've heard that women who work in city offices get propositioned by passing men when they are forced to smoke on a busy sidewalk. How awful that would be!"

"It would be much nicer if workplaces had special smoking rooms."

"I hope Zorba found a new job quickly and found someone more suitable than me to light up his life."