| Biographical Non-Fiction posted March 28, 2020 | Chapters: |
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The new job presents unexpected problems.
A chapter in the book Remembering Yesterday
New Job, New Problems
by BethShelby
| Background After the death of my first child, I take a job doing commercial art for a glass factory. |
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The job I took in May of 1960 has long since gone the way of the dinosaurs as many of my jobs have. The plant would call it quits in 1968, but when I went to work there, Knox Glass was a thriving company with three shifts and hundreds of employees. There were many buildings on the complex, but the one I worked in contained two work rooms, a darkroom and a small restroom. I worked in this building with only my supervisor. He appeared to be a very kind and fatherly man in his sixties. To someone twenty-three, that was old. My dad was just in his forties. He insisted I use his first name, Lee, rather than call him Mr. Peterson.
I was given a large drafting table and all of the art supplies I would need. His table, which was exactly like mine, was only a few feet away. Lee showed me around our area and took me on a tour of the grounds. I got to watch molten glass being dropped into molds and become bottles. Lee explained what kind of art we would create and showed me some of his own creations. I decided he was a talented artist and would make a great mentor for someone like me, who was just starting out in the field.
Back then, almost all soft drinks were in glass bottles and the labels were printed directly onto the glass by the silk screen process. People returned their drink bottles and were refunded around two cents a bottle. The bottles were thrown into a big pile where they were melted down and recycled. At that time, it was very popular for peanut butter, jelly, mayonnaise, and other condiments to be marketed in tumblers that could be reused as drinking glasses. Our job was to design decorative motifs for the tumblers and design labels for the soda bottles.
When Lee learned we had just buried our first child, he couldn’t have seemed more concerned. The loss was still fresh and I was vulnerable and needed his understanding. Not having my own parents around to console me, Lee was like a surrogate dad.
Designing the tumblers was something I enjoyed. Some of the work was tedious such as cutting out small type, letter by letter, and positioning them to become paragraphs describing ingredients, weights and other information included on the drink labels.
We took morning and afternoon breaks. Lee would go to the other room and make coffee and call me in to join him. Usually one of the engineers from another department would also come over and have coffee with us. At lunch time, Lee would drive me in his car to another building where a hot lunch was provided for the employees.
I got acquainted with some of the dye makers, the engineers, and the guys who burned the art onto the silk screens. Most of the women were in the big office building or deep in the factory doing shift work. While Lee and I worked we would talk. He was a storyteller and he’d tell tales of growing up in Texas during the Great Depression. He told how he hopped a freight train and bummed around the country, picking up odd jobs and making a living doing sign painting.
By July, I realized I was pregnant again. You and I were both delighted, but naturally we were concerned that what had happened with Susan could happen again. I kept calling Susan’s doctor to see if he had results of the autopsy, but he seemed reluctant to talk to me. We were sure her death was caused by the DPT shot, because he’d checked her and pronounced her in good health before he gave the vaccination. He finally told me that the autopsy didn’t show anything conclusive. He said it was probably a virus that wouldn’t show up on one so young. They had quarantined her with encephalitis after the spinal tap but he didn’t mention that showing up on the autopsy. He kept saying it wasn’t the vaccination. We wondered if he was trying to protect himself from being sued.
About the time I started my new job, my next door neighbor, Dot Schultz, invited me to join a bunco group. Twelve girls got together once a month to play this simple game. There were four players at each table throwing three dice and scoring points. I don’t remember all the rules, but I do remember it was a fast paced game and that everyone changed tables and partners often. It was a time to laugh and have a good time without a lot of competition since it was all about chance. We had refreshments and prizes and took turns as to who would host the next gathering.
In October, one of the girls in our bunco club had a Halloween party at their farm and husbands were invited. You agreed to go with me although the only guy you knew in the group was Dot’s husband, George, and you didn’t know him that well. There was food and party games. The hostess had hired a black lady she knew who told fortunes with playing cards. She wore a turban and sat behind a curtain with creepy green lights. We entered one at a time and gave her a dollar to tell our fortune. Most of the guys decided to skip the fortune telling since many of them considered it garbage. The girls didn’t take it seriously either, but found it fun to compare what she told us. Since our hostess planned that as a main attraction, all the girls went along with it. My mother would have been horrified to see me going to a fortune teller, but since it was more like a party game, I took my turn.
At first, she told me a lot of generic stuff that could have applied to anyone. My ears perked up when she turned over a card and rolled her eyes. She looked at me intently and said, “Honey, you got sompin’ going on in yo stomach.”
I wasn’t showing, and I wasn’t about to tell her I was pregnant. She saw my alarmed look and turned over another card. Her next words calmed me down. “Dis card here say, you got nothing to worry `bout. Every thang in there, gonna come out just fine.”
If she was to be believed, that was a relief. Everything needed to come out after nine months. When she turned over the next card, she pursed her lips and started shaking her head.
“Uhm…You got two men in yo’ life what's in love wit you. You needs to be careful. One of deese men, be an ole man.”
That one didn’t make much sense. “Are you talking about my daddy?,” I asked.
She rolled her big dark eyes again, and said, “I don’t thank so, but I speck yo daddy love you too.” Well that was eerie. I was glad it was just a game and quickly forgot about it.
Until my stomach started growing, I kept my pregnancy a secret at work. When I told Lee, he was understanding, and said I could work until nearly time for the baby to come. Afterward when the doctor said it was okay, he wanted me to come back to work.
In early December, he told me I was wanted at the front office. When I went into the building, I was greeted by shouts of “Surprise!”. Word had gotten around and the girls in the front office were giving me a baby shower even though I didn’t really know any of them.
You and I had gotten the baby things out of storage and made our empty room into a nursery again. The baby was due early in February. It seemed I was spending a lot of my life being pregnant because just last February was when Susan was born. I was scheduled to a maternity leave in January to await the birth of another baby.
In November, I went to the polls for my first time, and you and I voted for Nixon over Kennedy. Because there had never been a Catholic elected president before, a lot of people were afraid Rome might influence the way Kennedy would govern our Nation. Up until that point, Mississippi and most of the South voted Democrat. Kennedy outspoken about civil rights and suddenly white southerners saw their way of life about to change, so the Republican party became the party of choice. At any rate, Kennedy was elected and my candidate didn’t win. I was proud of myself anyway for voting. I was twenty-three and this was the first time I’d had a chance to vote for a president.
Just before Christmas, everyone at work seemed in a festive mood. “Lee brought a bottle of vodka to work along with a sprig of mistletoe which he hung in the room where we had coffee. He invited an engineer named Hooper over for drinks. Hooper was a young guy who blushed easily. Lee got a kick out of making him blush. On this day, I was having coffee and Lee and Cooper were having drinks. Lee pointed to the mistletoe, which happened to be hanging over my chair, and said “Well, you know what that means. It’s time for a Christmas kiss.” I thought he meant to kiss me on the cheek to embarrass Hooper, but instead he walked over and planted one full on my lips and not just any kiss. This was a French Kiss. I was too shocked to react. Not only was Hooper blushing, but I turned a deep crimson as well.
“I wasn’t expecting that kind of kiss," I said trying to keep things light and not make a big deal over it.
Everything changed after that. When we got back from celebrating the Holidays, Lee told he me he’d gotten drunk and told his wife he was in love with me. He said he left town and drove all the way to Texas to talk to his brother about it.
I couldn’t believe this was happening. I am married and having a baby and how could anyone even find me attractive. I knew immediately that I wouldn’t be returning to this job after I took my maternal leave of absence.
“You can’t be serious. I haven’t done anything except be your friend,” I said.
“Yeah, I know. I didn’t have any business saying that. It was the liquor talking. I’ve got to try to make things up to my wife. We need to have you and your husband over to the house, so she can meet you and know nothing’s going on.”
"No, we can’t do that,” I said. “She’ll hate me. I don’t think my husband would go.”
“You have to go,” he told me. “If you don’t she is really going to think something is going on.”
In the end, we did go. I didn’t dare tell you much about what was going on. I was afraid you'd think I’d done something to lead him on. You’d always told me that men and women couldn’t be just friends. You said men didn’t think like women. They didn’t know how to be friends. I hadn’t believed that. How could I work with someone and not be their friend? Now I was starting to wonder if you were right.
The meeting at their home was the most uncomfortable thing I’ve ever experienced. Mrs. Peterson never smiled. I tried to make conversation, but she barely talked. She sat at the table and picked at her food without really eating anything. It was more than obvious we weren’t welcome there. Lee tried to keep a cordial conversation going with you. Both of us were relieved to get out of there. I took my leave of absence the following week. That was when the phone calls started.
 Recognized |
It is 1960 in Jackson, Mississippi. I continue remembering my married years and as I if speaking to my late husband.
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