Letter To A Friend -- Halloween 2008

Hey Mike-y….

I know I’m in trouble with you by now, seeing as how you’ve called me twice already this week and I’ve yet to return either call as promised. Hope this letter rectifies things a little bit…

My day started weirder than usual, what with me being the only staffer to show up for work today—

Okay, that’s not strictly true. The true part is that I arrived early as usual and was able to get into the building to clock in because our engineer was there. The other staffers scheduled for the day were both running so late for various reasons that we didn’t open on time—in fact we were almost 25 minutes late. Try to imagine the increasingly perplexed and nasty looks I was getting from patrons milling outside the doors, wondering what the f**k was going on now. They peered in at me, their faces hardening; impatient to get to the internet access computers and resume those job searches, tighten those resumes, re-apply for those benefits, surf those porn sites….if I would just come on already and unlock the damn doors. What was my problem, anyway? Couldn’t I see them all standing there? Couldn’t I see a damn clock? Why didn’t I open up the muthaf**kin’ DOOR?!! Frank, bless his heart, went out there a couple of times, to explain the situation.

Me, I was humming with happiness. Not out of disregard for the patrons, whom I really did feel kinda sorry for, most of them. And not about Miss T, who had been suffering back pain all week and hadn’t been able to take off even one day to rest and heal, either because we were (we are) too short-staffed or because there’s been too much going on—school groups and reading groups and the little trick-or-treaters today—that required her presence. She called, having decided to take part of the morning off, but when she asked to talk to Marlena to let her know, only to learn that she hadn’t yet arrived, she was forced to scuttle those plans. Her voice sounded very weary as she assured me she would be in soon.

And I wasn’t smiling about Marley, either, who was this time surely looking at some kind of “official” censure for being so tardy (again), unless, that is, this time she had a truly legitimate reason; something act-of-God and unavoidable, like the morning sun had crashed into the lake and the resultant tsunami had flooded the streets, backing up traffic for miles…

Because the thing is, Mike, I really like Marlena. So does Miss T, actually. She (Marley) is the best, most conscientious worker in the place—aside from your truly ;-)—and everybody knows it and most of us appreciate it. I hate to see her of all people getting into trouble. When I consider the work ethic (or lack thereof) of others, it just seems so damned unfair.

No, I was happy because… um. Because….

Alright, give me a minute. It will come to me.

I walked to work today. I bet you would have too, if only your job was closer to home. It was just such an incredibly gorgeous morning, bright blue skies, golden, sunny, mild temps, and the trees all along the way so beautiful, absolutely ablaze with color. An almost perfect start to whatever the hell my day was going to become.

Then when I arrive at the front doors I can tell immediately that Frank (or somebody) is there because all the lights are up; sure enough he answers my knock right away, as though he’d been waiting for me. So I clock in on time/early and get busy with the morning set-up, listening to my Natalie Goldberg-Julia Cameron tapes (an interesting and sometimes funny conversation about the writing life) as I go, and I’m, I dunno, feeling pretty good, you know?

Then it got closer to time to open and still no one—staff wise—had shown up yet. When Miss T called and cautioned me not to open (at least one senior staffer had to be on the premises per library policy) I felt elated, positively liberated. This may sound odd to you, I realize. But don’t you love it when the ordinary suddenly becomes the unusual, the unforeseen? Something unexpected was going down! Maybe we wouldn’t open until noon! Maybe we wouldn’t open at all! Then I could do with this glorious day whatever I wanted.

And even if not, so what? Even if only momentarily, it was a giddying feeling, that feeling of the routine veering off course and possibly turning into something else, good or bad, didn’t matter. In moments like that, however transitory, however fleeting, you’re reminded of all the myriad, numberless possibilities of a morning, a day, a life. Ach, this probably makes no sense to you. It doesn’t to me, completely.

But while it lasted it was a good feeling.