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Showing posts from April, 2016

Trainwreck

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I'm just a kid, maybe 18, working a clerical summer job at a bank, i n a department  that, unless you are a finance major, feels opaque, like one big secret. But my job is easy, attaching labels for certified mail, filing documents. This is the pre-computer age, everything is on paper.  The entire department is female, except for the vice president, an older, sagging man in a pin-striped suit, long, white mustache. A skirt-chaser. He has a separate office, Mad Men  style. The women are in desks lined close together, forming a grid, front of the room to the back. No cubicles. The lights are fluorescent, pens click, papers shuffle.  The woman to my left is in her mid-forties, Greek. She takes a motherly role, shows me what to do, asks about my college plans, my boyfriend.  "Oh, I don't have one, but yes, I'll go to college in September."  She's surprised about the boyfriend part, and from here on in talks about the boyfriend I will have, and eventually marry,...

Snapshots: Spring Forward

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(1)  The Chinese Laundry   It's Curtains I kept looking at my draperies and thinking, just cut them. As in, I should cut them. They are ceiling to floor, and the window is only 56 inches high, so maybe a fresh look will do me good. But not having a sewing machine, and suffering from poor hand-eye coordination, I ask FD to bring them down to our local laundress. She's generally good with repairs, so this should be something she'll manage fairly easily. She calls me with an estimate, then assigns the job to someone else. Within a few days, FD fetches the drapes. He brings home four hangers, two with draperies, two with the left over material. "You're not going to like it," he says. "The guy who did the job ironed one curtain, then one of the scraps." "Not gonna' fly," says I. "I'll bring it back tomorrow." "Don't bother them," he advises. "They seem busy. I'll iron it." Not wanting to put him out...