12:17pm
Holy cow! The sheriff’s coming back to town! =]
Just yesterday I saw his name and thought, ”I know he’s not going to come back to work with us but it would be awesome if he thought enough about me to at least stop in to say hi while he’s in town.” I know that he comes every year around this time. It was one of those fantasy ideas though. Like it’s so not going to happen but there’s this tiny little hope in you. I’ve had the thought a few times this year but it’s funny that it was just this week that I’d had that thought. Then I quickly told my brain to shut up before I jinxed it. hah!
Anyway, I was working with a client this morning. The BBQ guy had just spent about 15 minutes in here bs-ing with me. Making strong hints about going on a motorcycle ride with him. I’ve always felt like he’s wanted to ask me to hang out outside of the office but he never does. I’m sure a lot of it has to do with our age gap. There’s 20+ years between us! I’ve always gotten along with his generation though. My sarcastic old man sense of humor must be to blame. I think he comes in here just because he likes to be harassed and trade witty banter. haha. So he’d gone to the doctor this morning and stopped in to say hi. He said he was going to get coffee but I didn’t see him walk that way after he left. He’d just gotten a phone call from some boss guy in Texas so I think he took care of that instead. Hope he didn’t forget to come back for coffee! He’d been fasting and was heading into work. We mostly talked travel, motorcycles, and bs. He was thinking about going to Laughlin for the rally later this month so that was a combo of everything we discussed. He’s so genuinely nice that guy. I so enjoy our conversations together. I would totally hang with him on the outside!
So yeah, I was feeling all good about that. It’s nice to have these fun quick conversations with someone. It makes me feel all sweet inside.
Oh quick sidenote: this lady came in earlier and asked some basic questions. I was able to give her a form to mail in and looked up some quick info for her. No big deal. It took me like five minutes and honestly wasn’t a big deal. About a minute or two later she came back and asked if there was some kind of comment card or something she could fill out. I looked around and said that no I didn’t have anything like that available. We only do surveys after they finish. So she asked if there was a way she can write something up and send it in. I ended up giving her a business card and wrote my name on the back and she asked if there was a manager she could address it to. We’re the only two people that work here so it’s not like any of it matters. Apparently she wanted to say a lot of nice things about me because she’d gone to a separate office and asked the same question and that person couldn’t help at all. I guess the girl acted like it was some big deal and had no idea what she was saying. This lady said that the girl spoke English so it didn’t seem like a language barrier and she asked the exact same question she asked me. Well I have no idea what the heck that girl was doing, or why she couldn’t help, but it worked out ok for me. I looked like the greatest person, with the best customer service skills ever, and I didn’t even do anything! If she’d been a regular client I would have filled the whole thing out for her and paid for the stamp to mail it, so I got off easy. Oh well though. Maybe we’ll get a lovely letter in the mail and I can pin it on my wall to make me feel better on tough days. :)
That was NOT a quick sidenote btw. hah!
But 2nd sidenote: The mailman just stopped in and dropped off a letter. We don’t usually get anything. It’s “official” so I glanced at it and guess what? It’s for TF! =| Did I mention he’d been emailing? Not sure if he thought it was Mom or knew it was me. A day after the winning thing I emailed asking if he’d gotten any letters with these checks. He said no, nothing, and I said “ok let us know right away if you do.” Now we just got this letter today. I haven’t opened it, but it’s the one we get cc-d on. I’m guessing he doesn’t know which ones we get or don’t get, so I’m curious to see how he’s going to get in touch to tell us....Why does everything happen on the same day?
It kills me because I can’t imagine being without him, but at this point I can’t exactly imagine being with him either. Darn emotional brain.
Ok back to my original story. Sorry I keep jumping around. I should have just done a play-by-play of the day. hah. So all that stuff happened, the nice lady, and the bbq guy, and I was helping Mom with a client and the fax line rang. I wasn’t even going to bother with it but I decided to walk over and look at the caller ID. I saw the Sheriff’s name, and recognized the number since I’d just seen it. I thought “oh wow!!” and then “why would he send a fax?”. Then I figured he just had the wrong number, people read it wrong all the time [gasp do you think he saved my card!?!] and decided to pick it up just as my heart rate increased.
“Hi, this is the Sheriff.” “Oh Hi! How are you!?” “Do you remember me? I worked with you last year.” “Yeah, I remember you.” “Oh? How do you remember me? You work with a lot of people.”
I laughed and made a joke about how I remember everyone, but I really wanted to be like, “duh! of course I remember you! I’ve been waiting for you!” There were so many things about him that I remember. I mean, it was so much more than just a regular ol’ client coming in here to work with us. But besides that there was also the fact that: 1) he’d basically forced me to do his paperwork when I tried to pass him off to mom [and by “forced” I mean he probably smiled at me or something lol], 2) his stuff ended up being way more complicated than he said it was, 3) I got stuck trying to chase him down after something went wrong and he disappeared for two weeks. So it was definitely not the typical client. It’s not like he just walked in, filed his papers, and walked out again.
Plus you know, there was all the stuff he meant to me that he doesn’t know about. The fact that I’d seen and noticed him even before he walked in. It was kinda fate. And the fact that somehow spending 2 hours with him was enough to convince me CK definitely wasn’t right for me [which I’d known but was still holding on to]. That was something not even TF’s flirting had been able to do. Also I completely forgot about TF that day, and for the following couple of weeks. Granted the whole TF thing was definitely still in its very early stages, but still, he totally got placed on the back burner without a second thought. I guess I should have taken that as a sign. It’s just that TF is the first guy I’ve ever liked that’s liked me back, or so I thought, so it was hard not to go back to that.
I remember thinking all these things after he walked in my door that day, so of course I remember him. More than just about any other client. But shhh…don’t tell him that! ;)
He went on to tell me that he’d be getting into town tomorrow and wanted an appointment for Friday. I thought he meant tomorrow but he clarified for next Friday. I wonder if he’ll be staying two weeks or just the one. He mentioned some stuff about his divorce being finalized [it has to do with our work - he wasn’t hinting! …I don’t think? lol] and I said maybe it would be less complicated this year then. haha. We talked about some other work stuff, and set the appointment for next Friday at 11am, and there were some jokes/teasing, and I told him to bring what he had and we’d see how it went this year. There were a couple of times where we both seemed to recall little events from last year so I’m glad it wasn’t just me. Like I asked if he was coming back for his vacation and he sorta hesitated before saying “every year” like he was surprised I’d remembered. Then when I mentioned a certain piece of paper he remembered he hadn’t had one with him last year. Stuff like that. Not a big deal. But clearly we both remembered that meeting a little better than we wanted to admit. =)
As soon as Mom was done with the client I go “guess who’s coming back??” And she had no idea so I said the sheriff and I mentioned how he complained last year about having to pay me to do the paperwork and I never thought he’d come back. She goes, “maybe he’s coming back to see you!! When is he coming? You better make sure you look nice!!” haha! My poor desperate mother. Her hopes must have been dashed after TF didn’t work out and she’s desperately trying to find a replacement. ha.
It’s funny because I’d had this fantasy of him coming back and like running off to the middle of nowhere with him. It sounded like such a perfect thing. Ending the season and just disappearing in to the wilderness. That would be like my favorite thing. Such a great way to decompress. To refill my batteries. To not have to socialize or deal with anything. I can totally see why he does it. Just to get away from it all for a while. I always thought that would be a dream come true. Mom had even joked throughout the year about how I’d probably want to disappear like the sheriff. And there’s a part of me that would really love to do that. Like spend the whole offseason in the middle of nowhere on my own, but I’m not sure how realistic that is. Could I actually survive on my own for that long? Who knows. But a quick week or two would be totally doable!
I know, I know! Nothing’s going to happen here. We’re going to get together for work, and I’m definitely going to mess around and tease him, and then he’ll walk out the door and I won’t see him again until maybe next year. I was expecting him to come back last year and take me out for a drink though, so I’m for sure going to bring it up when he stops by. He owes me! I worked way harder than I should have!
I’ll admit to being a little excited about this regardless. Something to look forward to in this coming week of crazy. =) And it’ll be an interesting little meet up. I’m a little flattered that he thought to look me up. That maybe he still has my card. That maybe I popped into his mind when he thought about his trip into town. He could have just walked in the door, or called next week, but he called today a day before he comes down. And he could totally do the paperwork himself. He would have done it last year if it hadn’t gotten a little complicated at the end. It should be way less complicated this year. Fingers crossed. So the thought is just kinda nice that he maybe might have thought about seeing me again.
Or none of that is true at all, but I’m still going to pretend! And dream of all the ways I can run off and drink whiskey on a porch in the middle of nowhere!
It’s worth it to have something else to think about. The Universe always knows exactly what it’s doing! Sometimes I just forget to accept and appreciate that.
rose.
9:33pm
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