Chapter 25

‎I sat in my SUV waiting for the daycare manager to arrive. I brought her a cup of designer coffee. I also brought a cup of truck stop coffee for me.

‎‎”Good morning Ed, so you came to see what we do here?” Sandra asked.

‎‎”I came to flirt with all the mothers and spoil all the kids,” I suggested.

‎‎”Well that sounds fair since I’m a mother. My kids have outgrown the need for daycare though. Does that mean I’m not considered flirt worthy?” she asked.

‎‎”Not at all,” I said smiling.

‎From eight till nine thirty Moms who had business with the court system or the county social services left their kids in the emergency daycare. It was a safe place where the kids could wait for moms return.

‎There were only three kids for the first hour but during the morning four more kids arrived. There were seven in all by five in the afternoon. Three boys and four girls. I was not good at guessing kid’s ages, so I didn’t even try. I stayed till five thirty when the daycare closed it’s doors. If there had been any kids left after the official closing time, a sheriff’s patrol deputy would take them home or to a relative.

‎If not that, they went to the on call social worker. They didn’t have to go home, but they couldn’t stay in the church basement alone. It was not the perfect solution, but Sandra explained it happens far too often. Handing over the child to the Social worker was the absolute last option.

‎I thought all the kids were cute, and I even felt sorry for them. I also saw the situation realistically as well. The procedures were set up for a reason. I didn’t like it but I was willing to go along with the plan and do the job I had volunteered to do.

‎Sandra was sweet, but after my recent trials with a younger woman, I decided to hang out at the senior center for my social contacts. At least I might have a chance to be a little picky. I hated feeling the pressure to perform. Like it or not at my age there were once in a while performance anxieties in several areas. I forced a change in the direction of my thoughts.

‎I never had any serious hobbies, so I worried that the things I did around the cabin were not good enough. I felt like I was too old to learn new skills. Maybe what I really needed to do was relearn the things I did know. Just relearn to do them the right way next time.

‎I was a little old to simply continuing to bull my way through things. I needed a more gentle touch, I thought. Knowing how something should work was not always enough information to repair it. Sometimes it required skill not just determination. Everything in my cabin worked, but it just was really ugly. The place looking like it had been constructed by a developmentally challenged young person.

‎Those thoughts ran through my mind as I headed out Friday morning to retrieve the packing cases. The first step in the case recovery was to meet Tommy Simpson. I arrived first at the local dinner. I looked out into the black sky beyond the window of the diner. Since it had rained all night, it was about as dreary as it ever got on a Mississippi winter’s morning.

‎There was a cold chill in the air which came with the winter rain. I didn’t look forward to the days work, but I had promised to get the cases off the trucking terminal storage lot. If Tommy wanted to back out of assisting me, I would have had to get a rental truck to do the job. Fortunately Tommy drove up and came inside with a boy in his mid teens tagging along.