Monday, January 23, 2023

Heller and Shannon: Relationships


There was a steady stream of people coming into the branch to say “Good bye” to Joyce. It was her last week.

Joyce graciously introduced Shannon to every well-wisher. “Shannon will be replacing me and I am sure you will like her. She has a boyfriend who lives in Sebawa.”

Shannon bristled at the personal information that Joyce was sharing. It seemed positively primitive to define a woman by the man she chose to date.

Seeing the expression on Shannon’s face, Joyce said “You know, they will like you a whole bunch better after they know you have a boyfriend. Most of our customers are women and they get very defensive around young, attractive, unattached women.”

“And they will absolutely love you when they learn he is a local boy. They will see that as you not looking down your nose at them...which they will assume if your boyfriend was from East Grand Rapids or Ada.”

After mulling it over a bit, Shannon decided that Saranac, Michigan was several decades behind East Lansing and should not be judged by East Lansing standards.

It was undeniable that the customers became more animated and visibly more welcoming of her after they learned she had a relationship with a local boy.

***

“Sure. Happy to help” Paul Andrews had replied to “Anita”’s request to connect on Pluggedin.

“What is your major and when do you want to start your internship?” he had added.

Shannon had given the matter of how she was going to play the relationship.

If she was going to stay in character, then she would only have one reply per day and that it could only be at 5:00 PM EST due to the time difference. That would be about 6:00 in the morning in Indonesia. She would let Mr Andrews worm it out of her that she was doing this on the down-low and early morning was the only time she had access to computers that were not monitored by authorities.

“Anita” responded “I am graduating with a degree in Journalism and Media and I have a minor in English. I have been told that my diction is very good but I am weak in idioms, which is something I hope to get better at during my internship.”

“I graduate in early January.”

And that is all she wrote back. She answered his direct questions and added just the tiniest bit more.

Andrews was clearly interested or he would not have responded.

It was important that Shannon played the character and let things develop over time. 
 
***
 
Heller asked Shannon if his sister, Suzanna could visit for dinner.

Shannon was fine with that. In fact, she had been wanting to meet his family but with his heavy work schedule it never seemed like there was time to do that.

Suzanna was a slightly more laid-back version of Heller. She was a Pharmacy Tech in Lansing and was currently “between boyfriends”. The break-up had been recent and it clearly still caused Suzanna pain.

Suzanna had caught her boyfriend building a relationship with a girl who was still in high school.

She had kicked him out of her house.

“You own your own house?” Shannon asked, a bit amazed.

“Well, me and the bank” Suzanna said.

“What I don’t understand is why a man would window shop for veal when he has Filet Mignon waiting for him at home” Suzanna said in disgust.

Suzanna had no lack of self-esteem.

Shannon was struck by a thought as Suzanna was describing the latest house projects she was working on. A sudden, very vivid image of Garth popped into her head.

Garth was one of the single professionals in her group. He was in IT and Shannon intuitively knew that Garth and Suzanna would either make a great couple or it would be a quick and epic crash-and-burn. There would be no middle ground.

8 comments:

  1. ERJ very clearly captures the difference of a large city and small town feel. In large cities, personal relationships are almost never discussed at work and certainly not with customers where in smaller communities, it can come up (and is not seen as prying).

    I can imagine that to modern 20xer's, the idea of owning a house at that age seems a foreign concept as it is only viewed through the lens of how they see the world in the places that they live. Look outside the large city and perhaps even outside your narrowly defined "what I would do for a job", and other things become possible.

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    1. All of my experience agrees with your comment. I knew many 20 somethings with their own home mortgages. Several paid cash for a clear title. A few working on their 2nd home, concurrently.
      Myself had opportunities to buy beginning at age 19.

      That is a function not of 'those days' but of placement. Entrepreneurial, an eye towards self-employment, working diligently to improve skill sets, not afraid of failure; these tend to create opportunities.

      About that 'eye towards self employment'; one can be an employee but with the notion that they are working for themselves. The perspective is they are providing a service to their employer/client. A B2B construct, as it were.

      This isn't just words. A brag to illustrate;
      By my 3rd year employment with a small business, the owner stated that of 26 yrs in business, I was the best employee he had had. Mind you, he had over 50 employees for most of those years. It is because I practiced what I said up above. He later sold me his business at a discount along with 2 yrs consultancy. I split the business into two divisions and later sold them.

      My first business failed miserably. But succeeded in teaching valuable lessons.

      Delete
  2. A little perplexed on where the plot is taking us, but that's a good thing! Enjoying this series Joe.

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    1. Oh how weary the lives of those who travel a straight trajectory.

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  3. Depending on how long this goes on, it would make a great movie or TV series.

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  4. I'm enjoying trying to figure out how the various "threads" in the storyline will all tie together. And VERY curious to learn just "how far upstream" Shannon will go to "snip the spine". Fun read, ERJ! Thanks!

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  5. And now it starts getting...complicated... :-)

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