Chapter 4

I didn’t see Susan all the next week and I had to call Jake and tell him that I was working Saturday and would come mow the lawn on Sunday. “I’ll come early and take everyone out to dinner so I can visit with your mom.”

“Okay. Will you take my two sisters too?”

“Of course. Are they going to be there?”

“Yes, and their mom too.”

“Great.”

I was welcomed with coffee and homemade rolls. Jake wanted me to rush out and mow the lawn and Suzy and Cindy did too because they had so much fun before. Susan and Wendy could have been sisters. Although their coloring was slightly different. They even sounded the same when speaking. I thought to myself “Nah, this too much.” Soon I had the lawn tractor out and with the three kids in the trailing cart. I glanced behind me often. About half way finished, I saw Jake trying to stand up.

“Jake, what were my rules when in the cart?”

“We were to stay sitting.”

“And were you sitting just now?” Jake didn’t want to answer. “Jake?”

“I was standing because you weren’t going very fast.”

“I know, but what if I had to stop quick? You would have tumbled off the front and if I hadn’t stopped quick enough the cart would have run right over you. Would you have got hurt? Probably, and then you would have had to go in the house. The girls and I would have finished the lawn and you wouldn’t be here.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I think you deserve some punishment, don’t you?”

“Are you going to spank me?” The youngest sister, Cindy, started to cry.

“No, I’m not. But I want you to get out of the wagon and stand there and watch us have fun for two times around the lawn.”

“Do I have to?”

Cindy said, “That’s not so bad, Jake. My dad would have whaled the hell out of me if I had done something wrong liked that. He was awful mean sometimes. I’ll get out and stay with you. Suzy can have the cart all to her self.” All three were out while I did the two laps. They were giggling when they piled back into the wagon.

Susan and Gram, along with Wendy’s help, had tuna fish sandwiches when we came in. Jake was whispering to Judy and Suzy. Finally Suzy asked her mother, “Mom, Jake says he has been to petting farm where they have animals that you can hold and pet. Can we go see them?”

“Oh, we have been here nearly all day. Susan has to work tomorrow and I have to as well. We can go some other time.”

“Mom, please?”

I spoke up, “We have time for a couple hours today and can go again someday in the morning for awhile longer. I’m up for it.”

Susan looked at me, “Are you sure? You haven’t had any time for yourself and you had to work yesterday.”

“I’m good. Is anyone else going? Okay, everyone load up if you are. How about you Karen?”

“Not this time, Gerry.”

Wendy turned to Gram, “I thought your name was Grace?”

Susan answered, “Don’t listen to them. They totally believe in reincarnation. Grady had some life readings and found out he was married to a woman named, Karen back around 1820. Gram has had a reading just a few weeks ago and found out she had a husband named Gerald. They even have me half convinced because Grady tells me I was there in the same time.”

Susan, continued, “I’m out to prove them either right or wrong. I have an appointment next Wednesday at 9:00. I have to be in my office so the clairvoyant can find my body or soul or something. It’s crazy, but I have found these two are so sure I am beginning to believe, myself.” Just then, the kids started making noises to get going.

When we arrived at the petting farm, Jake took over leading the girls around to the different pens. He saved the rabbits for last and picked up the large gray one. Soon all had rabbits in their arms.

When we returned to the house, I said I couldn’t stay for supper and went across town and home. I now got my lawn tractor out and mowed my own lawn. It was nearly 7:00 when I was putting my tractor away when Jake came running through the shed door. Susan had never been here before “Wendy and the girls left so we brought you supper.”

It was KFC meals. I was extra hungry and Susan shared some of hers with me. Jake ate some and then fell asleep on the couch.

My home was larger than Gram’s house. It was a typical center hall home with the stairs leading up to the second floor from the entry hall. Living alone I only used the kitchen, living room, and the downstairs bedroom. There were three bedrooms and a full bath upstairs. Downstairs there was also a large dining room and another small room and a full bath. I didn’t need a home of this size, but I was familiar with it.

The people my parents purchased the property from had trucked in stone and made raised beds for both vegetables and flowers. The back yard was nice with lichens growing on the stones. My parents then and now hired a landscaper to come every spring and get everything ready by renewing the weed control and mulch around the perennials and flowering bushes which they pruned. Just another habit I never would change.

I had one of the smallest riding mowers and two times around the beds with the mower, finished my weekly chores. My vegetables consisted of two different tomato plants, a couple of green peppers, two cucumber plants and with a few rows of greens and carrots.

Gram asked if she could walk around outside so we toured my flowers. Susan stated what a lovely home I had. “I don’t use the three rooms upstairs and it has been weeks since I have been up there. They are nice too.”

“May I go up?”

“Sure. Gram, were you ever upstairs when you lived next door?”

“No, but I would like to see it.”

Coming back down, Susan observed, “What a nice place you have. Now all you need is a wife and three kids.”

“I have that on my to-do list. I plan to marry before I’m thirty and have my first child the year after.”

“And who is the woman, Grady? You had better get on it.”

Gram said, “Yes Grady, who? You haven’t been out on a date since you have been mowing my lawn this season.”

“I have faith I will find someone during the winter. Gram, if you were forty year’s younger I’d propose to you. After all we were married once.”

Susan, stamped her foot, “I knew it, you two can’t get away from that foolishness.”

“Susan, it may be foolishness or fantasy. But you’ll know when you get your questions answered in a couple of weeks. That is if you are in your office Wednesday morning.”

“I suppose if I didn’t have so much baggage with being a single mother with a child I should look for a husband. I’m not going to because now I’m so wrapped up in my work. I love my job. Really Grady, I thank you over and over for that.”

“My pleasure. That move fitted right into my plans. I wanted the position I have just been given and I’m happy.”

Susan said she would wake Jake up so they could leave. Gram, said, “You know Grady, you proposed to a woman in a former lifetime. You could propose to the same entity in this one.”

“I could Gram, and I may. But it would crush me to be turned down again like Gerald was back then.”

“Well Gerald, promise me you will consider it. I’m speaking as Grace. I didn’t get a chance to know Sandra when I was Karen, but if she was anything like my granddaughter Susan, I heartily recommend it.”

“You do love me, don’t you?” We didn’t have a chance to say more as we heard Susan coming with Jake.

I received just a smile as Susan came out handing me a sleeping Jake.

The first week I was in my new office I mostly observed. It seemed to be a mad house. We had four engineers working on different projects. The rest (10) were support staff in one form or another. There was four of the support staff who were preferred over some of the others. I watched closely and often the four would stick together so sometimes one engineer would have the best help on his project. I needed a good copier operator. That left one person of the fourteen to place. I came up with a slot for one other person to do the filing.

I spent one Sunday sitting in the office with all the names in front of me I listed each person’s faults and weaknesses In other words I separated the engineers into four teams. Each engineer would get one of the preferred support men and one of the weaker ones. The person whom I chose to be in charge of the copier was a given. He had a gimpy leg and before this in using the copier, he would drag a chair to sit on while feeding and sorting the job into the folders for each engineer.

I had asked him about this during the week and he said he liked doing this and stated, “I’m the best ... ask anyone.” Usually at this point, the file then would go to someone to be cataloged and stored just like you would handle a book in a library.

I talked to Jim Oberon and he laughed, “Good luck with that. Men, I think are sometimes worse in their likes and dislikes than a bunch of women. Try it anyway.” Monday morning of the second week, Jim came in and sat in the back of the room I came out of my office and sat on a desk and told all to gather around.

“Okay, people, you all know I came here for a purpose. That purpose was to get this department organized. I studied things last week and I have decided to make some changes on how we work. We have four engineers so each will have two more team members on their team. I’m picking four of the members to be lead person under the engineer. Then I’m picking four persons to be understudies for the lead members. Pete is going to be in charge of copying and Brad is going to build a library of sorts to keep track of each project.

“Any, questions?”

“What if we can’t work with the people you chose for us?”

“Well it is going to work this way. You get to work one month and then we’ll switch personnel around. You probably have noticed that we have one lady engineer and two women who are on support staff. For the time being, I’m not assigning those to work together. That’s to save some poor man from being ganged up on. More questions?”

“What if someone doesn’t pull their weight?”

“Then, that’s my problem and you can come to me. Remember, though I have to have facts to back it up to discipline someone. Remember also, you will only be working with that team member for one month. You’ll just have to suck it up for that long. I’m not going to have musical chairs every day. You know everyone has their likes and dislikes, and I do too. Let’s say we aren’t going to have any childish squabbling.

“We have more important things that may trip us up. Brad needs to set up the catalog system and everyone has to get familiar with it. We’ll begin this way. Each project has a number and there will be a place for each team to put in a number when it comes to the engineer. The date will go before the number, and the date after the number when goes to the copier to copy and then the final date before being cataloged.

“This sounds complicated, but it won’t be after two or three projects are completed.”

One of the engineers groused, “We could be handling more projects if everyone did their job.”

“True and this isn’t any particular persons fault. A big potion is the way the system was set up and that’s why I’m here to change things. Each engineer is responsible for himself and his two support persons. You have a month to prove yourselves before I will be shifting staff around again. I’m not exactly fond of competition in the work place because that implies good and bad. I think you are all good if you will work together.

“You come up here and I have the people listed for each team. Sort it out and see if you guys can’t make it work.”

One of the women stated, “I’m not a guy.”

“I know but you ladies are in the minority. When I’m talking to everyone here it would be foolish if I said, “Okay, girls let’s get to work. You women are overall are as good, or better than the men. Besides, everyone comes to work in jeans. Suffer with me on this if you would.” I stopped talking, thinking I was digging myself into a hole. “Okay, forget guys and girls. From now on I’ll just say team or teams in referring to you when I’m addressing you as a group.”

The teams sorted out who each person would be on their team. I didn’t hear any objections. I pulled Brad aside and talked with him about setting up his cataloging duties. “Start fresh as of today. When you are busy, work on cataloging the finished projects into a sub set in case we have to pull it for some reason. It will get easier as times go on.”

“No problem. It is a good thing I have a library background.”

“I know, that is why I chose you for the job.” There were a few questions but were handled easily.

Jim finally came from the back of the room and closed the office door behind him. “Grady, this just might work. I’m impressed that there was so little argument in the teams. More and more I think all the people in this department really were disgusted with the snafus that were being made. You are correct, it wasn’t the people, it was the system.”

“Oh, I have no doubt but what some will develop.”

“I’m sure you will handle it. The Jackson woman is doing fine too. I’m glad you chose her. Do you know anything about her personal life?”

“I do. I’ve been friends with her grandmother since I was a kid. It was weeks before I knew the two were related. I hardly ever saw her because of her second job and I wasn’t over there at night and she worked weekends. She has a little boy who was kept in the house all day with a 75 year-old woman. I’ve made friends of him.”

“And Susan? Have you made friends with her now that she isn’t working so much?”

“She likes it that I am paying attention to the boy. Susan is friendly with a woman with two girls a little older than the boy so I’ve had to include them if I take the boy somewhere. If I didn’t love the old lady, I probably wouldn’t be so friendly.”

“Take either one of the women out. You’d have a ready-made family and get a little.”

“I can’t do that. Remember, Susan and I work for the same corporation and there is a clause that says I can’t.”

“God, don’t let that bother you. I picked my wife from the receptionist desk. Just make sure the two of you are friendly if you split up. We don’t need a harassment suit. Other than that it is your life.”

“Well, we’ll see. I don’t see it happening, but as the say, never is a long time.”

“Fine.”

Things went along quite well. The oldest woman who was somewhere near forty wasn’t happy. She came into my office, “Grady, I think I’m going to give my notice if you can’t find other work for me. I’m pretty ineffectual where I am right at the moment in the team you put me with. It isn’t the other two I work with either, but they are so good, I’m not needed.”

“Sealy, we’re going to change in another couple of weeks.”

“I know, but these teams are working so well it would be a shame to break them up when you feel you should go with your program. A couple have said they don’t want to change, either.”

I took a pad of paper off my desk and handed her a pencil. “Chore for you that needs doing. Go out and do a survey of what the workers want. Do you know how?”

“Sure, four teams, four assistants and four of us who are assistant to the assistant. I know everyone’s name.” While she was out doing that, I called HR and had them fax me their file on Sealy.

I was halfway through reading her file when she came back. One thing she had in her file was that she had operated a 3D printer. We had several of these in the corporation, but none in this department.

“So Sealy, what pops out to you about the survey?”

“First, let me tell you that I’m pretty much dead weight on my team. This is only because you accidently paired up the best engineer and the best assistant. Whether this was by design or happenstance, I wouldn’t know. About the other teams, they all seem to be happy and satisfied with each other just as they are. That leaves me in an odd position so I guess you won’t need me any longer. There doesn’t seem to be a place for me.”

“Well, you are honest anyway. I understand you are familiar with 3D printers. I can think of a few uses for one if I had an operator. One of our teams design a lot of small tools. Do you know how to make hard copies of them on a printer?”

“Sure, and I’m familiar with a CAD app as well.”

“Good, I’m going to get one in here and see what you can do with it. Maybe we can make something the sales force can use. What will you need to get started? Better yet, make a full list to use for demonstration purposes. I won’t go into this too heavily at first, but I don’t want to lose you from my work force.”

“I’d like that. I’ve heard you were a good boss and take care of your people,” Pause, “And you are. Thank you.” The rest of my first month went well. I found Sealy fully competent in the printer. I sent around a memo to the different departments, asking for ideas for the printer. I had a spare person who could handle making hard copies of objects within a certain size. There was enough for her to keep more than busy. She was happy and I was too.

Three weeks after Susan sat for her life reading, she showed up early on a Thursday morning, coming across to my office. “Grady, I have a letter back from the clairvoyant. It came yesterday. You said we could get together and see where I was 200 years ago in relation to you and Gram’s life back then. I guess I was a helper to care for your daughter Jessie, until she died. Then I went off on my own. That’s all I’m going to tell you this morning. Can you come over tonight? There are some surprises for me in the reading.”

“There usually are. Sure, I’ll be over. Oh, I was wondering if the girls in your department miss me?”

“You know they do. That goes for me too. I’ve almost invited you to come visit at home sometime during the week. Jake is all the time asking when you are coming.”

“I come over every Saturday.”

“I know, but it isn’t enough.”

“Oh, okay, I’ll be over tonight. Do you want me to bring anything?”

“No, just yourself, unless you want to get something for Jake. He loves you, you know?”

“No more than I love him.” I stopped at a toy store and picked up a couple of toys. One was a bulldozer and the other was a loader with a bucket that you could pick up dirt with.

Jake was waiting at the door when I arrived. I handed the bag to Jake. “Don’t open it yet. Let’s go around back where there is some dirt.” Jake followed me to an empty flower bed that had been spaded up the Saturday before. “Now you can open the bag.” Jake dumped the unwrapped toys out on the ground.

“This Saturday I’ll take you to a construction site and you can see some real construction workers operate these machines. For now, you put the blade on the dozer down and push dirt into a pile. Then with the loader, you push the bucket into the pile and get it full of dirt and drive it somewhere and dump it. This is also used to load trucks with dirt and drive the truck somewhere. We’ll look for a truck Saturday and you can use the loader after we come back from the construction site.”

“Oh, boy. Can I use them now?”

“Just until supper is ready. When Gram or your Mom calls, you have to go right in. I’ll come out with you for a little bit before you go to bed,”

“Okay, I’ll come in, I promise.” Jake got right into the dirt and started working his toys. Susan drove in just as I came around to the front of the house.

“Hi. Grady. Where is Jake? I’m surprised he isn’t with you.”

“He’s out back playing in the dirt. I brought him some toys.”

“Big toys? I meant little toys like the trucks he loves.”

“Well they aren’t that big, but big enough to play in the dirt.”

“He’ll never come in for supper, now.”

“We’ll see.” Susan put her hand out to thank me. I took her hand and pulled her gently toward me. She was close enough to hug ... so I did. For the minute, she let me, then hugged me, resisted, and then returned the hug.

She pulled away, looking up at me. “Why did you do that? I don’t mind, but I need to know why.”

“Susan, I did that because I didn’t do what I should have done to Sandra 200 years ago. The reason I’m here tonight is to fill in that time of who we were back then aren’t we? I don’t know yet whether that time in our previous lives will transfer to the life we are living now in this time, but I would like to explore that we might.”

“Okay, we’ll talk about it after we share our mutual readings. From what I have in my reading, you should have hugged me back then. It might have saved me a lot of grief. Let’s go in and get supper ready. Have you spoken to Gram yet?”

“No, but she watched me and Jake while we were out back.” The two women got supper ready. Susan shouted out the back door, “Jake supper is ready. It’s your favorite. Mac and cheese with a hamburger.”

“Coming, Mom. After supper you’ll have to came out and see my new toys. They are so neat.”

He came in and told his mother I was going to take him some place so he could see the real things. “Grady is going to take me to a scrucktion site to see them work. He promised me a cruck I can load dirt in.”

“Okay Jake, slow down, wash up, you are all dirty.”

“I know Mom, ain’t it great!” I hadn’t said anything about how long he could play outside after supper. When we got there, Jake kept begging for more time.

Exasperated, Susan exclaimed, “Jake, You came right in when I called you for supper. It is past your bedtime. How come you won’t do as I say now?”

“‘Cause, Grady promised me he would come out with me after supper, ‘sides he is going to get me another toy to go with these.”

Susan, looked at me. I laughed, “Okay, Jake, it is bedtime for you. I’ll be up after your shower and say goodnight.”

“Okay, Grady. I want my toys in the house.”

“No, not a good idea. Gram works hard to keep the house clean and they have dirt on them. Better put them in the garage.”

“Okay.” Finally, Jake was in bed and immediately asleep.

“Grady, how do you know what to do with a child. You’ve never been married and I never heard that you lived with a woman with kids. You are an only child yourself. Share with me.”

I grinned at Susan. “It is simple. I worked for a couple of months in a fast food place. I’d see women with young kids and how they handled them. I got a good idea from mothers dealing with kids with good and bad behavior. When I got to college, I took a course in child management and how to baby-sit correctly. It was only for one semester while I was waiting for another course to open up. I’ve also found what I learned there often works with adults.”

Susan thought for a minute. “I guess I understand. I would get so worked up and so mad at you when you first took over as my boss. I’d come into your office to confront you and when I left, you would have calmed me down and I actually liked you. You’re telling me I’m just a big kid, aren’t you?”

“Maybe, but a very pretty nice kid—beautiful too. I want to hear what you found in your life reading.”

“You may be disappointed, because there isn’t much about you in it.”

“I know how that goes. Like Gram as my wife back then. I know I loved her dearly, but overall it ended too quickly. I am surprised to find her again this time around.

We sat down at the dining table, each of us with the life readings. I’d guess I had the most extensive writings because I had written several times, years ago, and only once recently.

“Susan, Gram knows most of what I have so I’ll begin. First, my entity, named Gerald was aged forty-seven. I made my living as a Foreman or supervisor, working in a woolen mill. I was married to a woman entity named Karen, she being several years younger than I. Karen had a daughter, Jessie, who was seven when she died.

“I was very sad and knew I couldn’t cope alone with a young child. I engaged one of my workers to come and care for Jessie. This was Sandra, aged nineteen, who came to love her young charge. I apparently was devastated over the death of Jessie, at ten years.

“I had lavished much love on Jessie, but paid little attention to Sandra while living in the same household. When Jessie died, I as Gerald was crushed and looked to Sandra for solace. I proposed marriage. Maybe I was too abrupt or didn’t understand that Sandra had feelings of motherhood for Jessie that went beyond just being a caregiver. I was turned down and Sandra immediately went out of my life.

Broken hearted over the early death of Karen that I had never got over, the death of my young daughter, the refusal of my proposal of my marriage to Sandra, I sold my home. I travel west at age fifty to begin a new life.”

I paused now. “Gram and Susan, there is more about me in the last reading about my life, but I don’t see it as germane to the time when we were closely associated and the present.”

Susan said, “So, you were Gerald. Gram was Karen, I was Sandra, and Jake was Jessie all in that time, correct?”

“That’s about it.

Susan asked, “Do you know what happened after you moved away?”

“Some of it. Let’s not get into that until I hear about your life reading.”

“Okay, mine is pretty simple. My reading did confirm there was an entity named Karen, now named Grace, who was Gerald’s wife and they had a child named Jessie. Karen died in her mid-thirties when Jessie was seven. In the present lifetime, the reading has confirmed that Karen or Grace has met Gerald again when he was fifteen and his name now being Grady. Moving away from close association, Grace and Grady have reconnected again as very close friends.

“Going on, Karen, or now as Grace, has a granddaughter, named Susan. This is the first time Karen as Grace and Sandra as Susan have been in the same lifetime at the same time. Is that clear? I ask because I get so confused trying to separate the two lifetimes, then and now.”

I spoke. “Easy enough for me.”

“It is for me too.”

“Gram, thank you.”

Gram went on to recap, “Grady, I guess that is about all my reading contained about my life back then. I was married to you, I loved our daughter Jessie and I died early. I never met the person, Sandra, but I have now as Susan my granddaughter. I love her very much, maybe for the reason she took care of you and our daughter back in that previous lifetime. Jake, who is the same entity as Jessie, I love with all my heart.

“I did question my roll as Karen and why I had to die. I found out it was because of someone else’s karma and had nothing to do with any other person who are here with me in this lifetime.”

“Gram, what do you mean?”

“Karma, as you know is what goes around comes around. I did a person wrong before I came to be Gerald’s wife in a different lifetime with a different entity. I was working off the bad karma. It was a success, I was informed in this reading. The pain I caused you and Jessie by my demise was felt more by me than it did to you and her.

“The clairvoyant said I went through a period of agony, which has erased the bad Karma from the karmic accounts. Susan, Grady, and Jake’s love that I feel from you all in this lifetime is a reward in a sense for the agony I had to endure to balance my Karma.

“Wonderful, Gram.” I got up and hugged Gram. Susan did the same.

“I guess it is your turn Susan, to share your life reading.”

“Okay Grady, the reading isn’t anything like what I expected. I listed Gram first. I was informed that I wasn’t as close to Gram as your entity as Karen. Gram was paired up with Gerald in a karmic way that I wasn’t involved in when I was Sandra. However, I was paired in this lifetime with you as Grace in recognition that your life was now in karmic balance. I guess we all found that out from what Gram said a short time ago.

“I listed Grady’s name and found out that we both made a wrong move by not connecting more solidly back in a previous life time, this which was indicated, but not acted upon by either of us. I asked questions about Jake. It seems as though my love for that entity as Jake and as Jessie is the same in both lifetimes.”

I asked, “Susan is there anyone or any more you wish to share with us?”

She asked a question in return before she answered my question. “Grady you intimated one time that the clairvoyant said how you passed on. Can you tell us?”

“I suppose, but it has nothing to do with the people here or now in either lifetime. Yes, I guess I will. Remember that I was very sad back then. Karen had only been dead three years and I still missed her. Jessie died at age ten, and I was reaching out to anyone I could cling to. I thought Sandra felt the same way. I didn’t know for sure that she cared for me, but she had seen me through both of the troubling times that had landed on me.

“I knew she was as heartbroken as I over Jessie’s death. I must not have prepared Sandra for the proposal I was about to make. I just up and asked her to marry me. I’ve thought about what had gone wrong since and what I should have done. I should have asked her for a hug and held her, maybe talking about Jessie, telling Sandra how I felt and asking how she felt. I was too abrupt I know now.