Instant karma got me March 7, 1985
Secaucus?
Strange happenings.
The first few times I came to this Fotomat, I came at the
bequest of Bonnie, the area manager.
Secaucus was notoriously busy, a sitting duck out in the
middle of the Acme parking, where harried customers lined up on each side of
the booth, all demanding immediate attention, making me feel like Lucy from
that episode with the candy machine – I just could not keep up with the demand.
Bonnie had directed me here through the center of town
rather than allowing me to make a simple right off Route 3, maybe to lull me
into the false impression of a small town not being as manic as some other
towns are.
I soon learned differently, as helpless in this book as the
westward settlers in a circle of wagons surrounded by attacking Indians, people
thrusting canisters of undeveloped film at me, or demanding my providing them
with the photos from canisters they dropped off days earlier when some other
poor fool suffered their assault.
Maybe Bonnie was simply being Bonnie, making things more
complicated than they needed to be.
An amazon of woman in size, Bonnie dressed as if she planned
to attend a formal dinner, so over made up someone could have mistaken her for
a transvestite.
I like Secaucus, even from the bad old days of the slaughter
houses, when even with windows closed on the bus to New York, we had to hold
our noses against the stench.
All that gone now, nothing much has changed since those early
assignments – although my last time here the dismal blue donut shop got bulldozed
and pilings put in its place.
A new construction, a twisted snake of a building, has since
risen in its place with various small stores that include a pizzeria and a fruit
and vegetable stand. Yet despite these changes, the town looks pretty much the
same as the first time I got assigned here.
Fewer customers, no pounding fists on the windows on either
side, no impatient voices telling me we promised delivery today. Maybe the
lower volume has to do with the season, few people taking pictures in winter.
Here, for several days in a row, I found that my coming here
again smacked of instant karma, one particular petty crime punishing me with a
bit of irony.
Two days ago, Virginia K called me at home to tell me they
needed me here in Secaucus urgently.
When I arrived, I found a number of things undone, such as
sorting through the developed envelops people would soon want. Bob Adams, my
new boss, was glad to have me, and left here with an exaggerated confidence in
my abilities.
The driver came early dropping off addition developed film –
but not as much as I feared, and I sorted through the bag, separating chrome
orders from print orders, dealing with the reprint order next.
That’s when I noticed the overnight order I had failed to
process from the previous shift and had neglected to give to the driver so he
could have it to the lab and back for the next day.
Rather than admitting to it, I stuffed the order deep into
the bag of print orders that would go out the next day, leaving it to the lab
to take the blame for the mistake.
I felt more than a bit guilty about it, and panicked a
little the next day, when Rose, Bob’s assistant, called – me assuming it was
the overnight issue, when she hit me hard with something even more serious.
“There’s a problem with one of the bank deposits,” she said.
I could shift blame for a missed overnight order, but a mistake
in a bank deposit would fall on my shoulders.
Two checks were apparently missing.
I searched the store up and down, pulling open the cash register
and took orders out of every drawer.
Bob thought it was a bank error and said the checks would
turn up in a day or two.
They did. Only not as Bob had expected. The lab called. They’d
found the checks in the same bag with overnight order. I had apparently stuffed
them into the bag when I put the overnight order in it.
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