I arrived at the airport at 5:20 this morning, and by the time I left AeroKnow Museum for my employer 8.5 hours later, I was ready to boogie with the hard rock thing. Part of the pain involved at the natural stone showroom comes from grudgingly leaving where I want to be for where I must go at one point or another six days a week. Today I was ready. I had been on my feet in the research room for five of the hours and I was ready for a prolonged sit. I said SIT.
And I enjoyed the three hours for pay. Because Simon and I had shared the same room for only a few minutes (without a cross word spoken from either of us) I was in a positive mode in the quiet of a slow day with an Antigoni CD on the player, I conceived a constructive step in the direction of mutual benefit. When he called late in the day to see how the afternoon had gone I shared it with him.
Since I started working there, the first 15 minutes after 9 have been fraught with the most danger of antipathy (I much prefer propathy; don’t you?) as the fabrication and installation fellows arrive, usually about5 to 10 minutes after we open. Simon is focused on getting THEM organized first because the dollars will come not from learning what happened the previous day, but what needs to happen in the next hour: addresses, stone to load on the truck, equipment to take to the van that accompanies the delivery truck. Today I decided I need to arrive at 8:30. If Simon isn’t there, at least I will have time to download e-mails, pictures and make note of phone messages so they will be ready when he arrives. I proposed the idea to him as we talked briefly today, and he approved it. Big surprise! 
research room, AeroKnow Museum, Springfield, Illinois
Live long . . . . . . . . and proper.
