Sweetness with a Kick

Guava—that crunchy bite, the explosion of sweet-tangy flavor that lands somewhere between a pear and a strawberry. There’s just nothing like it. I haven’t had a proper one in over a decade, and maybe I’m romanticizing it by now—taste memories have a way of ripening over time.

You don’t get that here in the Midwest. Not really.

But when coworkers-turned-friends travel in from the southern neighbor to the U.S. of A., and they bring guava candies and spicy tamarind ones—the good kind, with just enough kick—it’s like a shortcut straight to your childhood. The kind of taste that says: hey, you’re not home, but you’re not entirely adrift either.

Speaking of coworkers...

I once worked with a brilliant young engineer—Berkeley grad, true-blue nerd. Let’s call him Mr. Q. One day, we were walking back from the cafeteria. Mostly me talking, him enduring. By the time I got back to my desk, my work laptop was lighting up. Messages from all corners of the office:

“Wait, did Mr. Q just laugh?”
“Was that... a smile?”
“Did you break him?”

Apparently I had.

My manager—smart in more ways than one—knew Mr. Q needed someone who talked so much he’d be forced to talk back, if only in self-defense. I was the chosen weapon of mass distraction.

Not that the whole team appreciated my talents.

I worked with some folks who would’ve preferred the manager just divvy up the team outing budget into our Christmas bonuses. (Can’t blame them—nothing says holiday spirit like cash.)

And then there was another colleague—another brilliant engineer, this time from IIT—the Indian version of MIT.

I scared the life out of him by calmly informing him, during one of my pregnancies, that if I fainted from low blood sugar (thank you, type 2 diabetes), he should grab the orange juice from my drawer or hand me a glucose tablet.

This was after he had already been told not to wear his favorite aftershave around me. It wasn’t me, it was the hormones...

Poor guy. Turned pale as a ghost. Never looked at a juice box the same way again.

What can I say? Some workdays are sweet, some are tart, and others just leave a lingering aftertaste you never quite forget.

And managers? Don’t even get me started.

It’s a workplace right to complain about yours.
But what if yours is calm, kind, and—ugh—reasonable?
Where do you aim your well-honed sarcasm then?

Imagine this: you’re fuming, mid-spiral, approaching your calm, even-tempered manager. He looks up, raises a single eyebrow, opens a clean page in his notebook and says—
“Do you just need to vent, or do you want me to do something about it?”

Talk about wind out of my sails. Sheesh.

Not all managers left me speechless, though.

My very first one was a gentle giant from Harvey Mudd—brilliant, slightly socially awkward, and deeply principled. He taught me something I hadn’t thought much about as a new software engineer: customer focus.

It wasn’t just a concept to him—it was practically a religion.
He’d ask, not “Does the code work?” but “Would the customer care?”

At the time, I was more fluent in compilers than customer journeys, but something about his quiet conviction stuck. Maybe it was the way he made “customer” sound like the real end-user of our decisions—not just a line in a requirements doc.

Speaking of firsts...

There was also the coworker who welcomed me into a brand-new company—and a brand-new world of databases—by gesturing at a whiteboard and saying, without irony:
“You should probably read Databases for Dummies.”

Welcome aboard.

I smiled, nodded, and got to work. I didn’t read the book—but I did read the code.
And I figured it out.

And then there was my Russian coworker—Mr. B.

He always looked so serious that folks in the break room would whisper,
“Are we sure he’s not ex-KGB?”

What I knew was that he had a sly, wry, subtle sense of humor—so subtle, I often wondered if he kept that serious demeanor on purpose, just to play up the spy image.
Go, Mr. Bond.

When I told him about the whispers, he didn’t even blink.

“Yeah? But what’s the downside? No one bothers me, I’m not forced into small talk, and hey—maybe it makes them think twice before coming to our team with silly requirements.”

Fair point, 007.

Sometimes the guava is real, sometimes it’s just candy— but the kick always finds you.

And then there are the quieter bonds.

Lunches eaten elbow-to-elbow, afternoon walks that doubled as strategic gossip sessions (or wellness breaks, depending on who was asking). Birthday celebrations with Champagne Bakery breakfasts or Baskin Robbins cake—or the details-withheld lunches at Karl Strauss, Miguel’s, or Café Luna. Though I’m still not over having to share the spotlight with a fellow attention hog who just happened to have the exact same birthday as me. (I mean, really—HR couldn’t screen for that?)

Colleagues by role, but family by the rhythm of shared days. Technically coworkers. Emotionally co-dependent.

Like the one who made chai at home and brought it in a travel cup just for me when I was visiting from Milwaukee.
You really can’t get homemade chai unless you’re home—but she made sure I could sip it anyway. No fuss, no announcement. Just there, waiting.

Or the friend who remembered I loved Punjabi food and brought me warm curry pakora (fritters simmered in spiced yogurt gravy), or a fresh-off-the-griddle aloo paratha (potato-stuffed flatbread) for breakfast—again, because I was traveling.

Some people remember your deadlines.
Some remember your food quirks and cravings.
And some? They remember what you miss when you're away.

Some lessons are quiet ones—

—the kinds you don’t even realize you’re learning until much later.
Others are delivered with all the subtlety of a system exception.
Both have their place. And both, oddly enough, stick.

And then, some come gift-wrapped in grace.

Like the coworker who is showing up every day, cheerful and focused, while quietly fighting through cancer treatments.
Makes my migraines and moans about mundane miseries feel downright petty.

And of course, there are stories better left between the lines—birthday brunches that turned into roasts, happy hours, get-togethers near campfires, initiation lunches, and that one bachelorette party in wine country...

Enough said.

That material belongs on a very different blog. One that’s definitely not PG-13.