Open Doors

Ann has a habit of leaving the back door open. It's not a bad habit when the weather is warm, but right this minute autumn is wielding her big windy broom, pushy summer away. It's not cold, but it's not warm either. The gusts shake the trees and the rustle of the leaves whisper through the door along with the angry birds who must grab the last of their provisions and fight against the headwinds on their journey south.

I bundle up before I realize the back door is open. Ann is off to work, riding her bike with a mighty tailwind pushing her up the gradual hill. She has no recollection, I'm certain, that she left the back door open. It comes to my realization only after the dog barks at the squirrel heading down the thoroughfare of the grape arbor that runs the full length of our lot.

I slept deeply last night stirred only by dreams that didn't fit. Often I have dreams where I am stuck in a previous version of my life. I am surrounded by people from my past who assume it is still the past even though I know that that part of my life has moved on. I wander around these dreams trying to convince myself first and then others that they are no longer who they think we are. When I wake from these dreams, I am comforted by the weight of Ann lying warm next to me, snoring gently and the dog at my feet, twitching slightly with dreams of his own.

I worked an 8-hour shift yesterday and today my feet hurt. In the department in which I work there are shelves and shelves of books on all sorts of outdoor activities -- ice climbing, kayaking, triathlons, and hikes with kids. During a slow period I found a book titled, "Healing Your Feet" and read about bunions and something called Haglund's Deformity. After years of suffering from the bump on the back of my heal, I finally found a name for my symptoms. Ironically though, the treatment for this "deformity" is opposite for the treatment of a bunion. And of course, I have both ailments on the same foot.

Work was more eventful after my reading with an angry, irrational customer rattling the calm demeanor of our department. I missed the whole thing, thankfully, but reports from my co-workers supplied interesting details. Apparently the said customer had an arm-load full of "stuff" that he laid down on the floor right in front of the stairs heading up to the second floor. He left it there for quite awhile until an employee came over, saw the mess blocking customer progress, and gathered up the menagerie and placed it behind the counter of customer service thinking someone had forgotten about the mess they'd created.

The customer had not forgotten. When he realized his potential purchases were gone, he yelled out loud at the bottom of the stairs, "Where the hell is my stuff?" An employee cautiously approached and was met with a bile whirlwind of insults and cursing. He was lead over to customer service where another employee tentatively entered the bout only to be slammed equally hard by offensive language and violent accusations. Others stepped in and diligently worked to gather up the "stuff" he'd dropped on the floor.

I was on break when all of this happened and I was on lunch when the customer tried to purchase his goods from our department's register. Still belligerent, he grew hostile again when the bicycle helmet he wanted to purchase was not on sale. Fred, my co-worker, lead him to the location of the helmets to show the man that the helmets next to the one the man was trying to purchase were on sale and NOT the helmet he'd chosen.

He was not appeased.

By the time I got back from lunch, the tension was thick and added into the mix was a angry exchange between Ed, the former naval intelligence officer whose worked at the store for 12 years and Fred, the former Dead Head whose worked for the store for 34 years. Later, Fred told me he was requesting a transfer to another department, finally fed up with Ed's "right-wing angry and outbursts."

Not is all pleasant in retail.

I will be sad to see Fred go. He is a perpetually happy man who jokes with me about disco dancing and politics. I cannot make mistakes when Fred is around. No matter my error, he'll describe one from his storied past that surpasses any screw-ups I can make. Yes, he's rather forgetful and sloppy leaving $200 sunglasses out on the glass display cases, forgetting to put them away or selling display models for %20 off when there are plenty more in stock. Still, I like him because he doesn't let his job rule his life.

Ed is a different story. As Chris, my supervisor said, "He likes to pretend he's in charge." After 20 years in the Navy, I would imagine it's a hard habit to break.

I told Ann all about the interesting escapades at work and then laughed when I thought about how uninvolved I was in all the politics and shenanigans. "Not like teaching is it?" Ann asked. And it's true. I earn $10 an hour. That's not enough money to make me get involved on any deep level.

What I do find interesting is how many people my age work on the retail floor and how all the managers and supervisors are half my age. Fred told me he tried to be a manager, but hated ordering people around. Ed on the other hand despises the managers feeling they are incompetent and uneducated.

And then there is Myrna. I love Myrna. She's in her mid-sixties, a former "D.C. government official," and the spitting image of librarians from my youth. She is beyond OCD, spending her down time organizing anything she can get her hands on. She has taken me under her wing and shouts out things like, "Now you get over here, this is a perfect teachable moment." I can hardly wait to get her perspective on the politics of the department, the split between Ed and Fred, and hear the stories of the angry customers she's had to watch throw tantrums.

Meanwhile, I continue to feel the weightless of NOT teaching this year. There are things I miss like knowing exactly what I'm doing and how to do it, but there are more things I don't miss. Every day I see them in Ann's tensing shoulders, her worried sleep, and I hear them in her troubled words as she recounts a meeting with parents or tells the troubles on her staff.

I have vowed this year to do whatever I can to make her year as comfortable as possible. I made her dinner yesterday and left it in the fridge to heat up when she got home. I cleaned the house the other day so she could come home to fresh scents and uncluttered surfaces. She is appreciative, enjoying as she says, "having a wife" in her life. Today I'll make her some fresh pasta for dinner and wash the sheets on the bed so she can sleep a tad more comfortable tonight.

And in the morning, I'll make her coffee and perhaps oatmeal with fresh frozen blueberries from the local farmer's market. She'll take the dog out in the backyard as she does every morning to watch him stretch and sniff and take care of his business and then she'll come in leaving the back door open behind her. I'll bundle up again until I realize that the birds chattering away are not living in the kitchen, but are simply taking advantage of the audience the open door provides.