One Small Victory For Cindy Marie!

With Worm’s departure to her relatives down south and my job at Michigan Hospital Association, I was not in a position to play full time servant to Killer.  Killer firmly believed that in a couple one person had a career and one held a job.  He felt it was my duty to hold the job as he had a career, but I wanted a career and I took the bull by the horns to prove I was worthy of a career with the hospital association.

This job offered me freedom from the shackles of marriage. I was hired as a claims representative and within a very short time had achieved two promotions. I helped produce a slide show to present to the hospital staff for training purposes to teach how to investigate a work related injury from a supervisor’s perspective. I was challenged with not only handling a claim case load, but also to travel to our client’s to educate staff.

I loved what I was doing despite hating workers compensation.  I became an expert in the field. Back in the early to mid 1980’s Management by Objectives (MBO) was introduced as a means to evaluate your employees based on objectives that were to be met through their performance. I am a person that sees the maximum, not the minimum.  The goals were based on a scale of one through six, with six being unattainable and three being what was expected. I did not discover this until after the first year when I attained sixes on most if not all my goals, but I had worked like a dog to achieve this.

I learned the lesson that goals that are set are attainable, but if you reach for the stars and snatch them from the sky, the next year you will be required to control the universe so don’t be so gung ho on proving you are worthy or soon your goals will be unattainable at any given level.

This job allowed me to travel throughout Michigan.  It allowed me to stay at nice hotels and attend conferences where I met people from all walks of life.  Prior to Worm’s unexpected transfer to Alabama, I had made a deal with her.  I had a conference at Mackinaw Island and I had several visits to make on my travels to the island. It was about the time that she would be out of school for summer break.  The deal was if she could behave and that was to follow some simple rules that were not difficult for a period of time up to our departure, I would take her with me.  She was so excited for this trip, but within days of our departure, she screwed up.  I’m sure it had to do with food or lying as most times it did.

She was devastated that she was going to miss out on this trip that she had her heart set on. I was disappointed that she blew it so close to the deadline. I let her  stew over the fact that she had blown it and the day before I was to leave, I told her that although she had not held up her end of the deal, I would still take her with me.  She was elated with the news and we took off the next day.

It was a memorable trip for both of us. We stopped along the way after I would do a presentation and have lunch or dinner.  One particular day when we were just south of Traverse City, I stopped and bought a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken and we stopped at a road side picnic table and had lunch.

We got to Mackinaw Island and while I attended the conferences, she was able to be free.  She knew the rules though. If she tried to steal, she’d have to deal with me and she already knew I was teetering on taking her down without batting an eyelash. We rented horses and went for a trail ride.  We rode rented bikes; we just enjoyed three glorious days on the island with no constraints and free of the Devil’s watchful eye.

I took my Mother on one of these trips to the Upper Peninsula for well over a week. We were up there about the time that deer season opened and in Michigan everything closes down for deer season and some things are open only during deer season.

We were in Hurley, Michigan for a day or two on a lay over waiting for the hospital staff to return from deer hunting so that I could continue my round of the Upper Peninsula and head back home.  I was gone for close to two weeks by the time I returned home.  Mother and I had such a great trip.  She especially enjoyed it as a get away as Dad had retired and she was not used to him being around all the time.

We discovered in our travels that you could judge the size of a town by whether it had a McDonald’s or a K-Mart. If one of those did not exist, we were in a village, not a city.  Hurley did not have either at the time. It was minutes from the border of Wisconsin and a ninety minute drive to Duluth, Minnesota.  Mom loved to travel with me because there was no schedule.  I had to be at my appointments and work, but if we had time and we saw something of interest, I stopped or turned the car around.  My Dad didn’t travel that way.

This one particular day that I was free to wait for the hunters to return, I suggested we drive to Duluth.  She just couldn’t believe I’d do that but we did and we had a great time exploring. We returned to Hurly in time for dinner. I was always dressed to the nines and Mother dressed up to go to dinner to the only restaurant in town.  We were approached by the manager who wanted to know if we were from around there.  I responded that I was on business and was in town for a couple of days.  We bantered back and forth about my “business.”  I was oblivious to the fact that Hurley, Michigan during hunting season was the mecca shopping grounds for ladies of the night who serviced hunters.  Mother and I laughed like school girls to think they thought our business was conducted in the red light district.

But with Worm’s transfer I still had to maintain the duties of the wife and strive to meet my lofty goals of my career. I approached Killer about the house hold chores and splitting them.  Again, I must have lost my mind.  I was informed that a woman’s work was in the house and a man’s responsibility was outside.  Damn if that equality thing didn’t bite me in the backside again.  Visions of my brother having to mow the lawn once a week and burn trash verses my task of washing dishes every day slapped me in the face like a cold shower.

Killer mowed the small lawn on a riding lawn mower that didn’t take much time considering how small the lot was. He would snow blow the driveway and sidewalks, but that was not often. On the other hand, I had cooking, cleaning, laundry and assorted other tasks to do in addition to working more than forty hours a week.  I decided to schedule my self out of the house from Monday to Friday.  Surely, he would have to do some chores in the house in my absence!

Killer would ask me how long I was going to be gone. If I was going to be gone five days, he wanted five cans of tuna fish purchased at the grocery store. When I returned on Friday, I would find five opened empty cans of tuna fish stacked by the sink.  Five plates, five sets of flatware and assorted coffee mugs waiting for me to take care of them.  He didn’t throw the tuna cans away.  He didn’t twist at the waist and open the dishwasher door to place the dirty dishes in, he just left them.

He didn’t hang his clothes up.  Before I left, I had to pick out his clothes for one week or for however many days I was going to be gone. I swore I was going to start buying him geranimals to coordinate his clothes. I went so far as to place tags on clothing that matched so he could pick them out himself, but he just found this to be cute and amusing, not functional for his needs.

He’d pile his clothes in Worm’s room and I would have to hang them up when I came home.  I had laundry to do ironing to do as well as grocery shop and clean. I was growing tired of this inequality and I knew inside my days were numbered.  Worm was gone and I didn’t expect her back home ever.  I knew she’d see this door of opportunity and take it lock stock and barrel.  But she didn’t and she was coming home before I could plan my get away.

One particular night, after a long week on the road and an early morning on the road to start back up again, I came into the house to find everything waiting for me to pick up and take care of.  I needed gas in my car and just did not have the energy to go fill my tank before coming home.  I was in the kitchen cleaning up the tuna banquet that Killer had left for me.  I asked him to go fill my car up with gas while I cooked dinner.

Without breaking his stride, he turned around to walk out of the kitchen with these parting words, “it’s your car, you fill it up.”  My head spun around to glare at him as he departed the kitchen.  Did he just say what I thought he said? I put down whatever I had in my hand and I followed him with such determination.   What did I have to lose; I was a short timer in this living hell.

I opened the library door and just as clear and distinct as he had taught me to speak, standing just as tall as he had trained my spine  I told him,  “When you can drive that #$@$%#^%# car into this house, I’ll fill it up, but right now it sets outside and as I recall that is a man’s job!” I turned around slamming the door wondering how many more seconds I had before the coroner came to take me away.

Killer came into the kitchen.  Smoke was coming from my ears I was so mad.  He didn’t say a word. He picked up my car keys and walked out the door.  Within fifteen minutes he returned, without a word, he had filled my car up and was waiting for dinner to be served.  Apparently my message was effectively delivered.  Inside my heart skipped a beat – I could smell victory!