Christmas & Work

   This Christmas was especially lonely for me. I had absolutely nobody to spend the holiday with. Even my Aunt and Uncle were out of the state for the holiday. I spent Christmas Eve on the Internet. . I hadn’t gone into an internet chat room in almost 4 years, but I was that bored and lonely.  I ended up IMing with a girl named Mandy who was currently living in Colorado, but was visiting her father in California. She was bored and lonely too. We actually chatted online for hours… at least until 3AM. It was crazy.

  I think she may have wanted to meet me in person, but it was back in that ‘meeting people from the Internet is scary’ (long before eHarmony or Match.com) so if she did hint at it, I wasn’t biting. I would have disappointed her because she was under the impression when we first started chatting that I was black. I don’t know what I could have said to give her that impression. If anything, I am more in aligned with ‘Weird’ Al’s “White & Nerdy” than the original, “Ridin’ Dirty”. She ended up dating another guy she met on the Internet a few months later which was all good, because I was really just looking for a friend. The best thing was we e-mailed each other all the time and became sounding boards for each other and whatever problems our lives had over the years.

  On Christmas Day, I went by myself out to the movies. Jen had asked me a while back if I ever had done that, and I hadn’t. I never did anything ‘by myself’ that seemed like it would be a social engagement. Similar to when she asked me if I ever hugged my father. Ummm… No. (When I moved to Colorado and said goodbye. I consciously hugged him. I think he was surprised). Only Jen had been able to make me try things outside my comfort zone. (Until Miss Elaine). Anyway, they rereleased Star Wars Episode 1 – The Phantom Menace in the theaters and to me, even though it was the weakest of the series, Star Wars was like a comfort food.

  That Monday, I started my new job at Colonial Bank, a small local community bank with 7 branches in the Denver Metro area. Because I had no previous banking experience, I started off with the basic entry level positions. My primary position was going to be the drive through teller. Alan was my direct supervisor and there were three other tellers I would work with, all female. Shawn was head teller, a blond girl originally from Texas, who I would quickly learned was a compulsive liar that made up stories that was always ‘one better’ than any story you had. Marijana, an attractive but opinionated single mom. When any customer asked her out on a date, would check their account balances before giving them an answer. Finally, there was Jennifer, their newest teller. She was the one the hired instead of me the month before. Actually, Gary had decided to hire her before Alan even interviewed me, Alan just didn’t know. Alan later told me how happy he was another teller spot opened up so he could hire me. Jennifer had just gotten married and moved to Colorado from Chicago in October. So the two of us, both being newbies, would become fast friends. There was also a new accounts rep named Amale that was originally from Morocco.

  However, the person I really got to talk to the most that first day was a guy named Eric that worked in the back room. To get a feel for how the bank operated, they had me work back there for a little bit. I helped him stuff customer statements into envelopes. In the back room was an elderly woman named Geri, another woman named Gloria and Eric, who usually handled electronic transaction and wires.

  Eric was all excited to learn I was from New York and had all sorts of questions. He was really a friendly guy and I liked him a lot. I was more fascinated that he lived in Hawaii for a time. He was an army brat and actually moved around a lot. He had lived most of his time in Texas, and I told him that I was going to be there for New Year’s. He was jealous. He wanted to go, but was told he had to be ‘on call’ New Year’s for the bank, just in case the Y2K Bug destroyed the computers.

  I did nothing to prepared for any Y2K disaster. I had no money to stock up on food. No place to store extra gas. Heck, I was more concerned about making it to Austin in time. Heck, all I really had was the Jeep, so as long as the engine didn’t blow up at midnight, I was good to go. After four days of work I hopped into my Jeep and drove 13 hours to Austin, Texas to celebrate A2K.