Every Time I Think I'm Out...

16

So I had a great interview for a job I didn't care about getting, a grocery store job. I'd been there and done that, but apparently my not caring and not 'dressing up' for the job interview made all the difference and four months later they called to let me know I was hired. Add to this that I had just gotten a job, at least tangentially associated with my chosen field of computer programming, as a computer room monitor and tutor at my local Business College... But that job was only one day a week and rather than turn down the new job, I decided to accept on the phone and then let them know when I arrived in person that I needed room in my schedule for my other job and evening classes.

If the first grocery store I had ever been to in Colorado had been half again the size of the only two grocery stores I had worked at, combined. Then this new ''warehouse sized'' grocery store was twice the size of that, including height, not just floor space. Think of a modern day Lowes or Home Depot store in size except with aisles of groceries instead of tools and supplies, in a green with white color scheme. This was near a decade before either of those two hardware stores had even thought about opening a branch in Colorado. When interviewing for the job at a small new building next door, I knew this grocery store was to be built in the empty field next to it, but I had never thought it would be built using the whole frigging field!

Awe struck as I saw this new huge building for the first time at the far south end of town, I pulled up to the front of it and entered through one of its two large archway like doors. I drifted around a bit before I discovered and walked-up to the customer service desk. As the store was not yet open, the hired employees were assigned to drift into the building in groups on the hour and my group was going to be the dairy/frozen food crew. Six of us were sent to wander over to the department head, 'Butch' and discover our jobs.

The 'Svenson' family were originally from Minnesota and had moved into town and taken over the lagging grocery store, oddly enough, right next door to my old Radio Shack that I had gone to in my first years in Colorado. In the three years in between they had turned it around and had now won a franchise license of a new grocery store chain. If all went well, they'd earn the chance to get another license for a second store at the far North end of town. While the seven male members of the family had been the right size to personally handle the smaller store, for this giant store, they'd split-up into two shifts, three for the morning and three for the evening with the patriarch father now taking a presiding role for the company, drifting in and out as he felt. Thus a series of department heads had been hired as the direct reports to the family members and then each department head assigned the pile of employees it was deemed they'd need.

When I walked up to Butch with the others and we introduced ourselves, I let him know right off the bat that I'd need Saturdays and evenings free for school. I could tell right at that moment that if he'd been in charge, he would have passed on me working there and picked someone else. But as the Svenson family had done the interviewing and hiring, Butch probably assumed they had hired me knowing my work hour restrictions and thus said he'd work it out. This first day was to meet & greet the department heads and be told the basics of working at the store and tentatively sketch-out our weekly schedules. Once all that was settled, we were told to come in this first weekend to work both days filling all the shelves and the store would open on Monday. I reminded Butch I'd need the Saturday off and was thus grudgingly told to come in on Sunday.

When I arrived Sunday morning a bit more than half of all the shelves and cold cases were filled and I realized they must have had semi after semi pulling-up to the loading docks all day Saturday just to get in all the initial stock. For this day, we were to breakdown the remaining pallets of stock which had been put into the dairy cooler and freezer room and finish filling the shelves. Six hours later we were done and handed our official schedules for the coming week. I was scheduled for the afternoon into the evening and once again had to remind Butch of my night classes. He grumbled, then decided he'd work the evening hours of my schedule and tweak things by the following week.

Being the only significant grocery store on this edge of town, it was a huge success in its first week and that success rolled through the first few months and the holidays. The six of us, all with around thirty hours each week, would work whatever was needed for either the dairy or frozen cases. No assigned places, just go fill what you noticed was low. By the turn of the year, one of our number was already gone. I never knew why, but he missed out on the bonus payments in our end of year paychecks, between fifteen and twenty-five dollars apiece, mine was eighteen dollars as I remembered.

Also, by the end of the year, I'd even lost a few pounds, too. Never a bad thing!

While there was a chance for advancement at the store, with my stuttering and not wanting to make this my career, I kept to my place as the others who started with me that first day gradually formed up into a hierarchy and with the new year the store would reach both its peak and have its crash...

And I would play my cards just right.

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My Big Chance!

15

Though I was only averaging about four days of temp work each month, it was enough to keep me from depleting my remaining savings too quickly and I was relieved when we found out I could get an account at the hospital's Credit Union. The original bank my mother had put my money in had started to eat up my remaining cash through 'maintenance fees' when it dipped below a thousand dollars. But by transferring it to the Credit Union, I didn't have to worry about it and was able to subsidize my employment gaps by nibbling away at my remaining saving.

The software start-up company was gone. Apparently the firm that was going to market and distribute their work didn't pan-out. Thus the previous year's educational software package was never sold to schools and my game was equally doomed. Without my help, the military guy they had borrowed was not enough to get the prescription tracking software suite completed in time for their first dead line and the military contract dried up. Al was soon working at the local newspaper as the computer operator for their systems. As my dreams had been dashed by the start-up company, now his were as well, at least for the time being.

As for me, I was still trying to make do with the occasional temp job I would get while still attending night school classes. Given my lack of steady employment, I was still qualifying for grants and student loans to cover all of my business college expenses, so that wasn't an issue. And the night computer teacher was still a huge fan of mine and was keeping his eyes open for a computer job for me. Until then, it was a few more construction jobs.

I got a three day construction clean-up job at an apartment complex being built just outside of town. While this construction crew didn't have the temps do work outside of clean-up, they did have the newfangled air nailers as they put shingles on the roofs and used the temps on the ground as nailer target practice. I quickly realized that the way not to be target practice was to stay out of sight under the eves as I carried my bits of debris to the dumpsters. I finished these three days without any nails in my back. My final construction clean-up job before the season wound down was at another apartment complex where they were installing the drywall onto the framed walls. The crew laughed and showed how they were walling up eggs in the frame behind the drywall as they were pissed at their foreman; once the apartment complex was finished the eggs would eventually spoil and crack and leave them with a perpetual rotten smell. They had a good laugh about that and I was once again relieved when my two days were up and I didn't have to worry about being involved in that little scheme.

Then there was September with no temp job and I saw my remaining savings reach the double digits and I hadn't a clue what else I could do as I could never make it beyond the interviewing stage at computer job interviews. Then I got the phone call I had been waiting for from the temp agency: Would I like to work for the Big Computer Company in town? Yes, absolutely!

Oddly, though, I was to report at night but as it was the first time I'd gotten any chance to work there I wasn't going to turn it down and instead skipped that night of classes. I arrived at the main complex and reached the guarded front doors. I was ushered in and given a temporary badge and I was there... To empty trash cans and vacuum the floors. NOT QUITE WHAT I HAD ENVISIONED. Still, it gave me a chance to roam the whole building and finally see it after years of hearing about the place. One wing was multi-floored levels of work cubicles, another wing was a construction floor where night workers were assembling minicomputers for some expectant businesses elsewhere in the country. In between the two wings was the expansive cafeteria. Once the night was done, there wasn't going to be another night as they only needed me for the one. After this, I told the temp agency I wasn't interest in any more jobs unless they were computer related; they assured me they already 'knew' I couldn't do a computer related job and none would be forth coming.

And that was the end of my time as a temp.

The very next week, the Saturday computer monitor at the Business College gave them his two week notice and I was immediately tapped to be his replacement. I was relieved that I would no longer have to worry about running out of money and not being able to buy food or gas for myself. Or so I thought as I reached my first day as computer monitor with my last few dollars in my pocket. The original guy overlapped with me on this day and I was supposed to learn from him everything I needed to know to run the TI-990 minicomputer and keep it backed-up. He showed me how to boot it up in the morning and where the backup disks were kept and he went out to get a cup of coffee at the local 7-Eleven... And never returned.

I think this was intended to be revenge for the nighttime computer teacher wanting me to take his job even though I hadn't asked to, thus he left me as the new computer monitor without any significant training with the expectation that I would soon fail and make a fool of myself as I hadn't a clue. But being computer savvy, I figured it all out on my own by the end of the day and soon earned some respect from the doubting daytime computer teacher.

Then I discovered I wouldn't get my first paycheck until the end of the biweekly pay period in two weeks. I knew, given my current lifestyle of averaging about five dollars on food each day and maybe one dollar on gas, what little money I had wouldn't make it until then. Given my five year long friendship with Jeff, and knowing I'd have the paycheck in two weeks to pay him back, I asked if I could borrow twenty dollars to get me through till the following week. He explained to me that he never lent money out to friends.

I was stunned. But I realized that I had asked and thus I should have been willing to accept the answer, whatever it was, without complaint. This was a lesson that I took to heart for all the future times I asked something of someone, ensuring that I did so without any expectation of the answer I wanted to hear. I made due for that final week by eating every other day and thus used the last gallon of gas in my car to pick up that first paycheck and cash it at the bank.

The next day the long forgotten grocery store people called up and offered me a job.

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Runaway

14

After my surprise around my thirteenth birthday, I had largely decided to ignore my 'situation' by burying myself in my school studies, work, and hobbies. But by August of Nineteen Eighty-Four I had run out of work and didn't know if I'd ever find any job again. While I was still attending Business College, with them allowing type written work, my grades were no longer held back by my limited ability to write by hand. And what few hobbies I had petered out between projects.

It occurred to me I wanted to tell somebody about my 'situation'...

At the same time I knew no good would come of it.

I realized I avoided making new acquaintances, though through the happenstance of life I still did. When visiting Jeff's house, there'd be other people visiting some days and thus I'd meet them to. Going to classes, I'd get into the classroom and after a couple months being with the same group of students you at least learned their names and chatted about the subject matter or the weather during class breaks. When mother would engage me in conversation on the rare times we were both in a same room together, I would talk about these people I met, 'Chris', 'Pat', 'Jessie', 'Casey' and my mother eventually shouted, ''What sex are these people?!?!?!?!''

This was when I noticed I had adopted a pronoun light way of talking about people over the years. I'd say ''I saw Jessie at school today and we talked about the coming midterms and what things to do over the weekend. Jessie's kid had to see the doctor again for a sore throat, I hope it isn't serious and Jessie doesn't miss too many classes.'' After mom's outburst, I reflected and realized that I had naturally drifted into doing this over the eight years since my thirteenth birthday. I guess by taking the gender pronouns out of my language, I was making it easier for me to fit in.

I would often sit at home after school and chat online with Jeff and think to myself, I'll tell him. I'll type about it in my next sentence. Just after we finish this little bit, then I'll let him know. But I never did. With each new person I met, I'd tag-on in my mind One more person to be horrified and have nothing to do with me once they found out. I'd be friendly with everybody, but unless we had a point of interest that we were both avid about, I never got that involved with their lives. When visiting friends it was always with a task in mind, I would never visit them just to socialize. My 'situation' made this easy: Girls wouldn't be more than polite to me for fear that I might get 'interested' in them. Most boys didn't connect with me as they'd most often be interested in sports, or getting girls to bed. Two topics I had no interest in. Unless you were interested in computers, science fiction, writing, or similar music, you never seemed to get to know me.

But I'd sometimes get to know you.

When I'd first lie in bed after my thirteenth birthday and ponder my 'situation', I decided I'd adopt the Golden Rule in life. As I'd like someone to listen to me, I'd make sure I'd become a good listener. As I'd like someone to pack my groceries well, I'd make sure I packed their groceries well. As I liked computer programs that were comfortable to follow and use, I'd make sure the computer programs I wrote would be that way. If someone was in their car and blocked with merging lanes or trying to get out of a parking lot, I'd be the one to let them by. I'd always say 'please' and 'thank you' and sometimes be made fun of by friends for how unnecessarily polite I was. And with the Golden Rule I knew I was setting the example for others to follow.

I'd be the person that others would naturally gravitate to when they wanted to talk about their lives, brainstorm problems of their own, or just have someone to listen to them when no one else would. They figured I'd never betray their trust as I never gossiped or talked poorly about other people behind their back. These stories of friends, relationships, parents and work all entered my head and once in a great while the most I'd do with them is pull out bits and pieces for characters in the stories I'd write. But only bits and pieces, never full tales. Those just stayed locked in my mind until the next time someone wanted to talk more about their woes, then I'd recall where we had last left off.

And in return I waited for that day when I could talk to them about the 'situation' in my life, when they would ask me if I had any problems I was facing and needed to talk about...

But it turns out the vast majority of people, or at least the vast majority of the American's I've met, like to talk about their lives at length more than they like to hear about your problems. And so I listened to people and in return I never told.

And by August of Nineteen Eighty-Four, without other distractions to keep my mind occupied, I was bursting with the desire to tell someone, anyone, of the 'situation' in my life. And the only reason this dam didn't break is because I knew no good would come of it. My friends would no longer be my friends simply because they wouldn't know what to make of it, become uncomfortable and simply avoid me. Acquaintances would become gossips, using the news of my 'situation' as grist for the rumor mill. And each new person I met I realized would become another person to lose when they found out.

After another chat session with Jeff online we ended it late at night and I was pent-up to bursting and grabbed my keys, my billfold, and hopped in the car. I just drove straight west, into the mountains and through them, for the next few hours as if running away from my life and leaving it all behind me. I toyed with the idea of finding some unknown town and starting anew. No one would know me, and I wouldn't know them and I'd have a fresh start... And then I realized that as I met them, they'd just become more people to abandon me once they found out about my 'situation'.

I couldn't run away from my problems because they were part and parcel of me. There was no place I could hide where I wouldn't be. No matter how far I drove, I would never get away from myself.

After two hours, I pulled over onto the side of the lonely mountain road and sat there for a bit in the night, only the lights of my car and the twinkle of the stars breaking the blanket of darkness surrounding me.

Twenty minutes later I turned the car around and took my problems back home.

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Possible Implausibilities

13

During my many gaps between temp jobs, Jeff asked if I could help him as he worked late nights and off days at his father's dry-cleaning chain. The chain was undergoing dramatic growth and one of Jeff's duties was to make sure the shops where set-up and operating properly to save on hiring outside help. While Jeff didn't mind doing this, he was concerned that something might happen to him, such as a cap blowing off of a steam pipe, and no one would be around to call for an ambulance. So he asked me to join him at these work times to effectively be on watch for his safety and occasionally serve as a second set of hands. In return he'd pay for pizza and once in a while invite me to expand my wardrobe from long forgotten items in the chain's lost & found boxes.

It was one of these times, a Sunday afternoon when Jeff was building the customer service desk at a new store, that I was the one that got injured. We were carrying in a full sheet of heavy plywood into the shop and had to make a sharp corner, I was the one walking backward while Jeff pushed from behind and my right wrist became pinched between the doorway and the edge of the board. At first Jeff didn't realize it was my flesh holding up progress and gave it a good shove to get it passed the obstruction. I had to tell him to stop. You see, for some reason I never learned to cry out when in trouble and instead would just get quiet. Being a stutterer I avoided talking anyhow, so people rarely noticed the difference between when I was in trouble and when I was doing fine. I had to ignore the pain of having my wrist pinched & smushed by having to speak up and say, ''Stop!'' I asked Jeff to pull the plywood back out of the doorway to free my wrist and then we finished bringing it in with me only using my left hand.

My right wrist first turned red with the scraped skin in velvety waves above. Jeff asked if I was okay and I told him I'd be fine, and thus he went to work while I picked-out a tape of music to play in the tape deck as he worked. By the time he had finished a good chunk of the work needed, we went to a next door pizza place for a sit down meal and that's when we realized the red scraped area of my right wrist was now a bulging blue mass. Jeff wondered if I should see a doctor, but as I knew I couldn't afford it, I glossed it over by telling Jeff I had a worse injury happen to my left wrist and pointed to where I had a prominent scar that I had gained in my Freshman year of High School. The thing was, I realized at that moment that the scar had significantly faded to be just a small patch of discolored skin. It made it harder for me to sell to Jeff that it had been worse than my right wrist was now.

This was when I started to first wonder about strange things in my health. Such as the ragged patches of itchy skin during my elementary school years that, once the itching was gone, had healed without a trace. My burst left eardrum that, once the scabbing debris had been removed by the doctor a month or so after the fact, was found to be a still working eardrum. And now my badly scarred left wrist that was just a shadow on my skin. Within another five years, that shadow would be gone and people would doubt me when I'd try to tell them of the time I'd gotten injured in wood shop at school. Ten years later, I'd tell doctors about my burst left eardrum and they would take a look and then call me a liar because they found no trace that it had even been burst. And now, at this time in Nineteen Eighty-Four when my scraped & smushed right wrist healed...

I once thought these sorts of injuries were permanent, that they were forever. Others did too and apparently as I'm different in one obvious way, I'm different in others. If you take a look at the inside of your wrist, you'll likely see this bulging blue vein that emerges from your forearm and reaches the base of your palm where it splits into the various smaller veins crossing your palm and reaching your fingers. When my right wrist was injured by the plywood, that injury had crushed and torn-up that vein and the blood was pooling under my skin at the wrist as it no longer had a clear path to follow into my forearm. But I didn't know this at the time, only figured this out after the fact and I couldn't see anything beyond the swelling blue mass at my wrist.

Over the course of many days, if not a few weeks, it stayed there like that until it finally started to resolve and the swollen blue mass withdrew to reveal that something I never would have imagined had happened. Where once I had a vein going from my right palm to my right forearm, I now had many veins that split apart where the injury had taken place, then meet back up at a single point when entering the wrist.

For years, when I'd tell people my stories of scars that disappear and burst eardrums that repaired, they'd have their doubts. So then I'd tell them the story of my wrist using my left wrist as I talk about the vein and the injury I had, then end the story by showing them the many little veins that spread apart and reached back up on my right wrist. For some, this is a moment when they'd go, ''Wow.''

For others they just call me a liar and tell me I must have been born with my right wrist veins like that.

Such is life.

As I type this, now twenty-eight years after the injury, those many little veins have slowly continued to change and merge into just two obvious veins. In another twenty-eight years would they have finally merged back into the original single vein? I will never know.

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