The good colleague comes home

You've spent all week being the good colleague. Patient with the difficult one, fair to the junior, generous with credit. Then you walk in your own door and hand your family the leftovers — the short answer, the half-attention, the irritation you'd never let a coworker see. The people who'll never quit, never review you, never write you up somehow get the worst of you, precisely because they can't fire you for it.

Marcus turned this exact question on himself, and the list is unsparing: "How hast thou behaved hitherto to the gods, thy parents, brethren, children, teachers, to those who looked after thy infancy, to thy friends, kinsfolk..." (Meditations 5.31, Long). He's not asking about strangers or rivals. He's asking about the people closest in — the ones a just person is most tempted to take for granted and most obligated not to.

The good colleague is just a person being fair to whoever's in front of them. Off the clock, that's a partner, a kid, an aging parent, the neighbour who always needs a hand. Same virtue, harder room — because here you've stopped performing and they get the real you.