AUTUMN... preparing for changes (Part 142d)
First things first
was a saying I got tired of hearing my grandfather say to me when
staying with him. Like a lot of young boys, I didn’t have ‘staying
ability’ when tackling difficult projects. I don’t know what made me
think of him as I looked out onto the work area and saw the mass of
wires strewn around by the telephone company workers. They had gotten a
bit out of hand and were making it difficult for the tellers to move
about. I decided to concentrate on that project because it was right
there in front of me and not 'pending'.
It was a bit of luck that I chose to
confront them when I did. The foreman on the job was best friends with
Trish’s boyfriend. I’d noticed him chatting with her from time to time
and felt he wouldn’t be upset if I asked him to concentrate on one or
two work areas at a time. He was nice enough about it and then hit me with an
offer I didn’t have to think twice about. Even though we’d only asked
for five dedicated lines he told me there was enough wire assigned to
the job to provide another three if we wanted them in the future. He
could lay in the wires during this installation at no added cost. Then
if we wanted to add more teller machines it would be a simple procedure
to activate them. It made sense to me. All I had to do was pick out
where they might go.
Their work day was over at 4pm. By then they had laid out
the wire for eight machines and would be back to finish the primary ones
in the morning. With that done it gave a me chance to think about
Laura’s request... and the problem that it presented. I loved the idea
of Joanie wearing the Sans Soucie panties like Laura was wearing but
getting to them was going to be difficult. I’d spread my pantie stash
out and into three different locations in and around the house. I’d hidden all the new panties
I’d gotten from my friend Willie in the cedar lined closet in the North
West bedroom now occupied by Anne. The only way to get to them involved a
bit of rearranging the contents and I didn’t dare try it while Elle was home or, for
that matter, Anne either. If Laura had asked me the past Wednesday or
Thursday it wouldn’t have been a problem. With Elle teaching and leaving
for work along with the older girls at 8am I would’ve had a window of time to
have gotten to them. Now... I just didn’t know.
Tuesday was the
day before the ‘busy period’ began so, for the most part, it was spent
making sure everything was in order for the onslaught of customers. The
telephone people were done by noon and all we had to do was get the new
machines in, test them and we’d be on-line. I couldn’t wait. The people
at the service bureau had assured me the we’d be amazed at how much
faster we’d be able process transactions. Albie told me that the lines of
customers would be noticeably shorter and that was something that
everybody was looking forward to.
Wednesday was more than the
beginning of the busy period. It was the full Board of Trustees meeting
and, hopefully the approval to allow the service bureau to input our
name and address file. That was the key to going on-line in December,
something I felt was imperative. I’d actually had dreams of still being
on the old system and having the bookkeeping machine (computer?) go down
before we got the IRS forms printed and mailed. Thankfully, being busy with all
the added customers, the day went quickly. When I saw the Trustees
filing in I started getting nervous even though I wasn’t going to have
to make the presentation in front of them.
It was a fairly quick
meeting because there weren’t many mortgage applications. I saw the
Trustees headed for the back door and was waiting for Hobie to find out
their decision when the phone rang. It was Bert, the president. He wanted
me to come upstairs to his office. Not a good sign. When I walked in I
saw Hobie and Gee, the Trustee who was an attorney, with the president.
The Board had approved what I wanted to do but under one condition...
that we could put off paying for everything (equipment, inputting the
name and addresses and training) until after the first of the year. I
immediately wondered why they called me in to tell me that. There wasn’t
much I could say but it left me wondering about the convoluted thinking
of the majority of the Board. Hobie said he’d call the service bureau
in the morning and I was excused. By the time I got back to my desk
everybody had gone. Even though there were things I could do I was so
discouraged that I picked up my briefcase and headed for the door.
Barbara
and her sister, Mo, were working with Jean and Anne on their ‘cheering’
as I pulled up the driveway. I hadn’t seen much of Mo since school had
started. As soon as my girls saw me they headed in my direction and the
sisters headed for the opening in the hedge. I was disappointed by that
as they’d been wearing their cheerleading uniforms. At supper Elle told
me that there had been a home soccer game and Barbara had invited our
girls to go and see them cheer. So, they all went and Elle had brought
the sisters home afterwards and they'd stayed to play. I mentioned that they had pretty much
disappeared as soon as I drove up. She just smiled.
More times
than not I just dragged my briefcase home without ever opening it. For
some reason I decided to get something from it and found an envelope
with just my first name handwritten on the face. Puzzled I tore it open
and found a note from Moira. I looked at the date and saw it was written
on the weekend and had probably been there since Monday. In beautiful
handwriting she’d written a note reiterating what she’d told me back
right after she’d been hired... “Thank you for believing in me...”. It
made me feel good but I honestly couldn’t think of anything special I’d
done or said to warrant that. It did make me think about her and the
situation she was in. In spite of all the other things going on I vowed
to follow up with her and her meeting with Gee the next day.
To be continued...
2 comments:
I bet those extra phone lines payed off down the road. I can imagine the phone guys crawling under the stations while the tellers were trying to work. Wouldn't that be an upskirt heaven!
BS... nice thought, but most of the work was done by drilling holes in the floor and then running the lines up from the basement.
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