Chapter 71
Leaving Panama Was Easier than Panama Leaving Me
“I’m at a payphone at the stores you told me not to drive past.”
“Which stores?”
“The stores that look like a crayon box exploded on them?”
“We are the second left after you leave The Dam Store.”
“Excuse me?”
“You said you were right past the school, at The Dam Store. If you come back
the way you came, you take the second left. It isn’t marked well, but it should look like
you are going up a beat-up gravel road… You know what, it’s easier just to come in the
exit and pull up to the trailer.”
I knew she suggested ignoring the exit sign.
I could see the trailer she was talking about.
After ignoring the keep off the grass sign in Panama, there was no way I was going to start another job interview with disobeying a sign.
I found my way up the gravel road, parked in front of the school, and walked to
the office.
Why would I go to a trailer?
I was instructed to go back outside through the large double doors.
The interview would be conducted down the hill in a trailer that served as the campus’
central office.
“Corndog. That’s why you go to the trailer.”
I went down the other side of the U that made up the school’s parent drive and drop loop.
To the trailer.
Like I was instructed over the phone.
The Guadalupe River was right across the street. Not what I expected. Texas was nothing like Panama. I couldn’t say there was no water. Without the dam, it would be nothing but a storm runoff ditch.
I stuck my head in the doorway.
“Excuse me? I’m Lee Ann, I’m here for the job interview.”
“Yes! I’m Lisa. I was the one on the phone with you. You were so close to
our school when you called. From here, you can smell the coffee at the Dam Store.”
She noticed the pained look on my face as she spoke the last words.
“Sweetheart, that’s the name of the store… It’s across from the dam? The Dam
Store. It was on the sign.”
“Oh, thank Goodness! I thought people were hostile. The phone is past The Dam Store. You can buy lunch at The Dam Store. I never was much for swearing and it’ll take a while to get used to that.”
“Well, let’s hope you stay around long enough to get used to it!”
“One year, that’s what I’m looking at right now. After that, it’s probably wherever
the military takes me.”
“Lee Ann?” The principal stuck her head out the door.
“Yes.”
“Let’s go sit outside for this. It’s a little cramped in here.”
“Either table will work.”
I was in a dress, so I slid on the picnic table bench from the end.
I placed my resume between us facing her.
“I’m Miss Henderson, the School Principal.” She offered her hand to me.
We shook hands as she sat opposite me.
“Our board took its time approving this math position. It didn’t open until 5 PM on Friday. Here it is Monday and I wasn’t expecting anyone fully qualified to apply. How is it you haven’t found a job yet?”
An open-ended question. I cautioned myself to be brief.
“I was holding out for a job in Panama, that’s where my husband is stationed. I had planned on coming two weeks earlier, but I ate a rancid pepperoni, and they wouldn’t let me board while I was sick. It took me two weeks to reschedule a flight out. I got here this past Thursday.”
“Panama, Florida?”
“No, Central America, for DoDDS, the Department of Defense Dependent Schools, it’s all right there in my resume.”
“I… give me a moment please. I haven’t had a chance to check over it.”
I sat quietly watching the children of the community play across the street in the lake.
There were several little ones balancing on the top of the concrete wall across the river.
I caught my breath as a teen pretended to shove a toddler off the high side of the dam.
She looked up concerned.
Misreading me, she said, “You get used to the noise, eventually.”
Nope.
I’m never getting used to someone not taking water seriously.
I smiled.
“Tell me something.”
“Yes?”
“How long do you see yourself staying?”
“Truthfully, just the year. Once my husband gets transferred here, it’ll be necessary to keep the family closer to San Antonio.”
I hadn’t considered any of what I was saying a lie.
Everything was so new to me.
Like I told my dad, I had six months to make up my mind.
“Do you have any questions for me?”
“A few.
First, what is an ATM?
I’ve been seeing those signs everywhere.”
“Excuse me?”
“You said the credit union didn’t have an ATM. I’ve seen those signs everywhere; there are more of them than McDonald’s! What’s an ATM?
I had been mentally calling it an “at M”.
“Automatic Teller Machine?”
“And… like a machine that does what a teller does? It gives me money?”
“Yes. And makes deposits.”
“People put their money into a machine. They just trust it?”
“Most people.”
File that for later.
“What do you see as a possible stumbling block for a new to the area teacher coming to this district?”
“That would be our boys here. They are a rough country boy tough attitude type student. It gets very dangerous sometimes.”
“Dangerous?”
I was horrified.
“How many shootings a week do you have?”
“Pardon me?”
“You said, ‘dangerous.’ I am asking, on an average week, how many shootings are there?”
Now she looked horrified.
“How many shootings were there where you come from?”
“Some weeks none, some five. It depended on traffic outside. It usually averaged to one or two inside though.”
Silence.
She studied my face.
She decided I was asking an honest question.
“I wasn’t talking about shootings. We’ve never had a shooting here.”
“Oh!” My shoulders released tension. “That’s good then. It’s just knives?”
“No… no knives either.”
“Sissy fights then. I can handle that.”
I smiled, remembering Rudy.
“I have a pinky trick.”
My confidence won her over.
“It certainly sounds like you can.”
Just like that I thought my life had fallen into place.
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