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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