Almost There: NJ

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Once upon a time...Part II

I think maybe I owe a debt of gratitude to my daughter for suggesting I start getting back to telling stories of my life. I have been feeling inundated with political hoopla. and I have been a part of it. Definitely time for a break!

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When we left my story, I had just agreed to move to New York's Long Island with an old high school friend. When I hung up the phone, it came rushing into my mind - how would my mother take this? Would she be able to keep the apartment and take care of her needs without me? (Many years later, when my son soberly told me that he wanted to move out, and would I be able to handle things without him?, I would remember this day, and have to fight to keep from laughing in his face.) When I broke the news to my mother, her first words were, "You're not taking the TV, are you?" So much for my concern.

My friend's mom drove us to Long Island and let us go apartment hunting. It was surprisingly easy. That done, we went home to pack. She drove us back with a small U-Haul to move in.

My friend had a boyfriend who lived in Brooklyn, and she had been to New York many times. I knew no one and nothing. Didn't even know how to start looking for a job. Since I had been working for some time in a Philadelphia hospital, it seemed logical to start by applying at the nearest hospital there. I found a low-paying, going-nowhere job in their Admitting Department. It would pay the rent until I could find something else.

I continued working at the hospital for a little over a month. It was pleasant enough, but since it was a Catholic hospital, I was working with the nuns. I never had any contact with other staff nor with patients, so it didn't offer any social life for me. That was taken care of with a couple of men from Philly who made the trip to see me, and by a seemingly endless stream of roommate's BF's co-workers and clients he insisted on bringing to meet me - each one worse than the last. But one morning I missed my bus to work, and had to call a cab. The cab driver was a college guy, and we got along very well. Didn't have to ride the bus any longer. He then introduced me to his sister, who was pregnant and therefore leaving her job. She took me to meet her boss - a local dentist. I got the job.

Through my work as a Dental Assistant, I met my future husband, and a year later we married. I'm sure I have covered that story before in earlier posts. But until then, I really enjoyed working for the doctor. He had another office in Manhattan where he worked two days and some nights during the week. The other three days and a half day on Saturday, I assisted at the chair. The rest of the time I developed X-rays, kept the lab clean, made appointments, and sent out bills, but it was a real pleasure to have the place to myself most of the time. I would lock the door at lunch time, and eat in the waiting room to the accompaniment of the radio. The office was just down the street from our apartment - and later, when I moved out on my own, it was still not far away.

After our marriage, I was a stay-at-home housewife, and 14 months later, a mom. That is the way it remained for the next twenty years, except for a brief foray as a Tupperware dealer when Ralph had his first heart attack.

Two years after Ralph's death, we moved from Long Island to Cape May County, New Jersey, near my mother and sister. And then the job search began once again.

It had been a long time, and I wasn't really ready to plunge into the working world again. I was still in a rather zombie like state, unwilling to accept the idea that my husband was not coming back. I was still going through the motions of daily living, without fully participating in it. That took me a long time. But I decided I needed to find at least a part time job. I found one. Just a few hours a day, in a Foto Booth. Do you remember them? Pre-digital days. The kiosk was in the local shopping center parking lot. I've always been crazy about photography, and it wasn't a very demanding sort of job. Why not? I enjoyed it. I got to look at everybody's pictures. And - best of all - that is where I met Wyetta. We quickly found we had a great deal in common. And she was as much of a photo nut as I was. Her kids were about the ages of mine, and that is always a great thing among friends. We made many a trek to the Point, or to Leaming's Run, or any place we could find where we enjoyed taking pictures and just soaking up the beauty of nature, sometimes just the two of us, sometimes with the kids. I was even able to set up a dark room of sorts at home. Good times.

Well, eventually the time came when I felt a real need to find a full time job. One of the regular patrons of the Foto Booth was a township cop, and he suggested that I apply for a job with the township. The pay wasn't anything wonderful, but the benefits were, and that mattered to me, since I still had two of the girls at home. Hospitalization as well as generous vacation time and personal days were very important to me. The hours were ideal with one still in grade school. And I lived only a half mile away, which was also extremely important since I cannot see to drive at night. I took a Civil Service Exam, came out at the top of the list, and got myself a job in the Land Use Department. By the time my youngest was 18 and the Survivor Benefits ran out, my salary at the township had increased enough to allow us to do just fine, thank you. A long, long way from the $32.50 a week that was the starting salary in 1950!

I worked for the township for 18 years. I could write a book about that alone. I don't think I want to. I retired eight years ago, and wouldn't go back for any amount of money!

And there you have it - the history of my employment. Hope you enjoyed it, Kitty. It may not have been all you anticipated. If anyone made it all the way to the bitter end - well, you were very brave. I'd like to end with "happily ever after", but "ever" hasn't arrived yet, and I guess "happily" is relative. But - I'm almost there.

Friday, April 18, 2008

WISHFUL THINKING

On April 17th, Liza at It's just me, also known as The Egret's Nest, posted a piece titled Have You Ever Fallen in Love (with a house? or rather a piece of property?) Her words and especially her photographs were beautiful, and made it very clear why anyone might fall in love as she did.

It made me think of a trip I made to New Jersey from Long Island, New York, thirty years ago.

My husband had passed away two years earlier. I wanted to make the move to Cape May County. My mother and sister both were living here. No family remained on Long Island. And it was the place Ralph and I had intended to make our home "some day". My youngest daughter and I made a visit to scout out the area.

We looked at many houses in North Cape May. Then we decided to take a break and wander down to the shore area. On the way we saw a house for sale, and I decided to take a look, even though it was way too large and too expensive. It was old, and in some disrepair, but I fell in love with it immediately. It just felt like home to me. I even loved the dirty, dingy basement. Can't explain why. Perhaps it was reminiscent of the basement I remembered from the house where I was born. The whole place was dusty and musty. No one had spruced it up to try to make a sale. There were forgotten odds and ends here and there - old bottles and boxes. They just added to the charm for me and I imagined myself investigating them. Who knew what other treasures I might have discovered in closets or corners. Ah well.

I tore myself away, and we put it behind us. My daughter had little interest. She wanted to get on with our trip toward the ocean. - Thirty years later, I am so grateful we could not

buy that house. The property across the street, which we had been told by the realator could never be built on, is now developed. And the taxes on that particular piece of property are today sky high. This is how it looks today. I'm not too fond of the dog statues in front, but it really does look nice. Someone has put a whole lot of work into it.

We went on to Cape May City. As we drove down Beach Avenue we saw a huge house, facing the ocean, empty and for sale. A beautiful place of course like most on Beach Avenue, but nothing I would ever have dreamed of, so far beyond my financial means as to be laughable, and far beyond the needs of our little family unless we intended to start a Bed and Breakfast. She wanted to look, and out of curiosity, we went inside. I thought it was beautiful, but had no further interest. My daughter, on the other hand, fell in love completely. She was awestruck by the graceful twin staircases, meeting on the second floor under a gorgeous stained glass window. And when we went upstairs and out onto the small balcony overlooking the Atlantic, that did it. She begged me to buy the house. When I told her it was impossible, she practically threw a temper tantrum. To an eight year old I guess nothing is financially impossible. "But Mom! We have to buy a house anyway. Why can't we have this one?" The temper was not like her. She was just so completely enamored of the place, she could not accept the fact that it could not be. She was angry with me for a long, long time.