Beginnings and Endings
Photo by Tim Gouw on Unsplash On January 12, 1999, I started work at an office supply store. Within two weeks, I had called off work twice and was a “no call/no show” once. (In my admittedly weak defense, the schedule was handwritten in those days and it wasn’t super clear to me that I was scheduled on the day of my no call/no show...) So I almost didn’t make it to the end of January 1999 as an office supply store employee. A couple of years later, on my wedding anniversary, I was skating on thin ice again. I had become a backup delivery driver and was tasked with delivering over $1000 in merchandise to a new business about 40 miles away from the store. I helped some employees of the business unload the merchandise into a building that they then locked before driving away and before I secured payment. Phone calls to the owner of the business went unanswered. I returned to the store without the merchandise or payment, ignoring direct orders from my immediate sup...