... put my arm around her shoulder and kissed her on the temple. The party continued. Around one, we ended up playing darts against each other. I had spent a lot of the previous summer playing darts, so I imagined I'd have a pretty easy time of it. But I lost. And, sadly, I wasn't even trying to let her win.
Or maybe not so sadly, because immediately upon throwing her winning dart, we were kissing.
On the way home, I told her, "Well, I know it's only a couple hours old, but so far this has been the best year of my life." I had my return ticket to Utah already, and my plan was to wait out the school until they let me back in. So after spending the first week of the year dating Persephone again, it was time for me to leave. We had a talk about what would happen while she was in California and I was in Utah, and that was when she told me she was "70 percent [my] girlfriend."
I boarded my flight. We took off and the day was clear enough that I could see Ventura County, could see Persephone's neighborhood. I thought, "What am I doing going back to Utah when my girlfriend is in California?" So I landed in Utah, got online and rented a moving truck and drove my stuff back home.
I got a job at Staples. I had to get up at 4 AM. I would occasionally see people I knew, which was embarrassing. One time I saw a guy from the city government who knew me from when I interned there the previous summer. He told me of a temporary opening I should apply for.
Staples was a terrible job. When applying I had to answer written interview questions. One read, "How many shouting matches have you been in at work in the past year?" The next question read, "How many shoving matches have you been in at work in the past year?" At first I thought it was a repeated question, so I went back and read it more carefully. I thought, "What kind of people do they have applying here?!" Then in the oral interview, the manager asked, "What are you willing to do in the line of work?" Like a good applicant, I said, "Whatever the job requires." The manager said, "Part of your duties involve hourly inspecting the restrooms. Let's say one time you go in there and see the stall is covered in feces. What would you do?" I thought, "This is the weirdest hypothetical situation I've ever heard."
But it wasn't a hypothetical.
After getting hired, I went once to inspect the restrooms and found one stall with feces all over the walls, door, toilet, and floor. I quietly backed out of the restroom and waited for a coworker with the same responsibility to discover it. Later that day he came to me and said, "Man, you would never believe what I just had to do!" I acted surprised.
Also, we weren't allowed to use coupons ("Coupons are supposed to bring in customers who wouldn't otherwise be here, but you're here already"), and we had to clock out at 10 PM and then close the store (balancing registers, re-shelving put-backs, and sweeping the floors). I complained and the assistant manager said, "It helps make sure you do it faster." When I left with less-than-two-weeks' notice, the assistant manager told me it was very unprofessional of me and reflected negatively on my religion. But I figured it got us even for the no-coupon and unpaid-overtime issues.
Persephone and I got married in April. So it seemed to some folks like we only dated for four months before our wedding, but it was really more like nine years.
We couldn't afford to live in our town, so we had to illegally rent a granny flat. I worked for the city department that enforced the granny flat regulations. When coworkers asked where we were living, I had to change the subject. When I was finally hired full-time, we moved to a legal apartment.
We were in bed asleep when my mother-in-law called to tell us about September 11th. We got out of bed and turned on the TV and saw the second tour collapse. Then I went to work for the day. Someone came in to get a permit and asked, "How are you?" I said, "I don't know." He said, "Yeah, me too."
By the end of the year, Persephone was pregnant with Crazy Jane.
via oneofthebest
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