Chapter 44

Johanna's turn:

Two more weeks. That's it. Two weeks! I will graduate college. Stoney says he's the first of his family to receive a college degree. For myself, both parents have degrees, Dad's masters includes four years from West Point, Mom's from Trinity College in Dublin. And now I'm getting ready to graduate here in Houston, Texas, US of A.

Double major, too, music and business administration. I have that 'music' part nailed. I could take a position with the local symphony, probably. I could take that 'business' bit, too, and get a position with some of the million businesses, large, medium and small, in Houston and the surrounding areas, like my Stoney with his engineering degree.

We, my Stoney and I, could have a nice, neat, normal life, you know, both work for a couple of years, get the house somewhere in one of the surrounding bedroom communities, then create the offspring we both want, thus presenting my mother with the expected and almost mandatory grandchild. Or two.

Except for that 'work' thing. Old world uncle. Big company with tentacles all over the North Sea, and that was just the beginning. Now you see that logo anywhere on the planet that oil and gas are underground, and that old uncle loved him some nieces and nephews. As in 'graduate college? Here's your trust fund.'

We wouldn't even have to be too frugal to just shut down that whole 'earn an income' thing completely and retire to a seaside or a mountain or a prairie home and do a life like that, except for some little difficulties like a husband who likes what he does for a living and a wife who would follow him through the fires of Hell wearing a wax bikini.

We can do music. Got two hundred and fifty dollars one Thursday night for a two-hour gig, he and I, for a group of music aficionados from an uptown church. Stoney on banjo, me on flute, Kendra, one of my college orchestra friends, on violin, and Key on oboe. There's no such thing in the music world as something written for that collection of instruments, so we adapted. We took Bach and Mozart and Haydn and disassembled and reassembled them into something different and recognizable and played those and then we zipped into the 20th century and took bluegrass on a way that could make Earl Scruggs laugh and at the end of the night Stoney and I gave our share of the proceeds back to the church's inner city ministries. So we could do that, too.

Neither of us want to stop those things. My Stoney wants to engineer. I want music. We want to be together. I don't know where HIS love of sail comes to him, but I suppose that somewhere in my Nordic-Hibernian gene blend there's something that makes me want to be on the water, too, so we've talked about that.

In the meantime, I'm enjoying life. Being Mrs. Randall 'Stoney' Jackson suits me well. I've accompanied him to company functions and to trade shows. Met Nikki Granger and Dan 2.0, her husband at one of them. Since she's an engineering student, Nikki eschewed the 'spouse's activities' that go along with these things, and if Nikki can do it, so can I.

Somewhere on the show floor Stoney and I met Nikki and Dan. "Let's you and me take off on our own," Nikki said. "It'll be fun!"

Okay, I'm geeky enough to be interested in a lot of the hardware artfully displayed in the huge convention hall, and I can't help but think Nikki's got something up her sleeve. I tossed a look at Stoney.

"Go ahead. You two are both insane, but in opposite directions. You'll cancel each other out," Stoney said.

"I wouldn't be too sure about that," Dan laughed.

We took off. Now let's look at this from an outsider's point of view. I know that when you look at me, I could be any age from fifteen to twenty-five, and I'm dressed like your standard college student, in other words, rather informal, but decent and tasteful.

So's Nikki. Except she looks younger. That dark brown Cajun hair, those blue eyes, a little bounce in her step, the only thing that might just be a warning is that instead of a purse she's got an olive drab tactical shoulder bag, one of those Cordura things with Velcro flaps and plastic snap buckles. Lord only knows what she keeps in it. But I've had many conversations with Nikki and I know, well, I have some idea of her brain. Think of a tea cozy over a land mine.

So we're bouncing around, looking at displays of electrical equipment that 99% of society doesn't even know exists, and Nikki spots something that catches her eye. She whispers to me, "We just built a panel with two of those in it. I did the networking and programming. Wanna have fun?"

Now here you are, the marketing, uh, 'sales engineer' for a company and two reasonably attractive (my words, not my husband's, but he's prejudiced) young girls walk up and stand there looking at your latest, greatest state of the art magic box. He's thinking that we're here to collect the freebies that most vendors give away at these shows.

"Hi, ladies," he says, displaying the requisite trade-show smile. "I have drink cozies and keychains, if that's what you'd like."

Wrong move. Nikki. "Uh, no, actually I was wondering when you guys are rolling out the new firmware for these. I keep having to work around your partial implementation of IEC 61850 protocols. It's crippled. I could be using your competition's devices, you know..." And a stone-melting smile.

I bit the inside of my mouth a little bit to stifle a giggle, adding my own smile to the bonfire.

Salesman goes "Whaaaa? Excuse me?"

Nikki charged right in. "We just built some panels for a utility company. I programmed these devices. I had to jump through a few hoops to get them to interface with legacy equipment from another manufacturer because you guys shorted us on the IEC 61850 instruction set. I understand the changes are coming."

He looked around real quick. I guess he was thinking that he was being messed with. Torpedoed. Gaslighted. He looked back at us.

Nikki was fishing a business card out of her bag. "Here's my card."

He took it. I think he was still trying to parse what was going on. He read "3Sigma ... Oh, okay, that rings a bell."

Her card says "Engineering assistant – Intern"

"I don't know where we're at with that firmware rollout," he said. "You work with our gear?"

"Some of our clients spec it. We give them the pros and cons of yours and your competition's. Your firmware is a problem. I'm looking at marketing a little interface box that piggybacks on your box and patches your omissions."

"YOU'RE building something?"

Smile. "Already have one working."

"Your company built it?"

"No sir. I built it. Well, actually I and Cindy Richards built it. Works, too. Just working up how to harden it for the industrial and utility environments."

"Uh, maybe we can talk to you and Mizz Richards? Is she here?"

"No sir. She couldn't get away from school for this trip."

"School?"

I was enjoying this. The guy was only a little bit away from visibly shaking. His brow had beads of perspiration.

"Yessir. She and I go to Auburn. She's fifteen."

"Uh ... If you don't mind my asking, how old are you?"

"Sixteen."

The poor guy looked at me like I might be some relief.

"Don't look at me," I said. "I'm just a music major."

He shook visibly. I thought we'd have to get a defibrillator.

Nikki dialed her shtick back a little and explained where she was with his equipment. The poor guy was shaking his head as we walked away.

Giggle. "Let's go see his competition," Nikki said.

We met up with our husbands around lunchtime, pushing our way into a crowded eatery. We sat down, ordered drinks and the daily special.

"Okay, spill it, Nikki," Stoney said.

"What'd I do?" she squeaked. "Dan, protect me."

Dan laughed. "Oh, no. I wanna know, too."

"We didn't do nuthin'," I said. "My sister and I just visited some of the booths. She asked a few questions."

"Nnnoooooo," Stoney said. "What did you do to that guy at Gentech?"

"What do you know?" Nikki asked. "I'm not into self-incrimination."

I was grinning. I like this.

"Me an' Dan walked up there and Dan asked him about 61850 protocol issues and I thought the dude was gonna have a stroke."

"I gave him my card. He had yours," Dan said. "He compared them. Asked me if you were for real."

"And you told him..." I urged.

"I told him that he'd probably heard stories of forest nymphs in mythology, and that Nikki is the much rarer and less documented Louisiana Marsh Nymph."

"A mythological creature," Stoney said. "He remarked about a 'music major'. I said 'THAT is a legitimate Irish-Norwegian forest nymph.'"

"Thank you, my dear," I said.

So I'm thinking that I really don't want to turn my back on this bunch. Every time I talk with them, it's like falling into a yard full of kittens, except the kittens in this yard have IQ's above 140. Stoney just shakes his head.

"That could be an answer, Princess," he said.

"Ya think?" I said. "It's a package, you know. Music. Engineering..." I paused. "Did I just say that?"

"What?"

"Music and engineering."

"I think you did."

"We break stereotypes."

"I know," he said. "You're too pretty and talented to be with..."

"Don't EVEN start, Randall Jackson! You are EXACTLY the man I was destined to marry." I have to watch this. Every now and then my Stoney gets morose. "And you're plenty talented, too, you know." I clasped my hands onto his waist and pulled him against me. "And your scarred, manly visage pushes all my 'I want a real man' buttons."

"Thank you." And kisses. If there was nothing on the schedule this evening, dinner could wait. There is, though. Dinner with Nikki and Dan. Had fun.

Okay. Reset to this week. I have one test left. Easy enough. Not because the course is particularly easy, but because I studied my butt off. Could've done a 'C' easily, but despite the fact that the degree was beginning to look superfluous, I have my pride. Not exactly 4.0, but the high 3.9's. Mom and Dad (and Stoney) will be proud.