JOE'S DINER - Chapter 6

WE ARE MOVING TO SEATTLE

 

I received an offer from a West Coast company with international connections and they wanted someone who knew the Chinese language and something about the business culture in China.

I told them they should get someone from the China mainland with an American college education. They would be far ahead of me in dealing with the Chinese business men.

They insisted they wanted me for they had already tried to do it the way I suggested.

It seemed it was hard for them to not look to the Chinese interest above ours and left us in a weaken position in negotiations.

They upped the salary and a longer contract to where I would make three times the salary I was making now.

I told them I would be finished with this semester in four weeks and then if they still wanted me; to send me the contract for me to look over.  If I found everything as was stated; they could make arrangements to move.

The contract arrived and I had an attorney friend look it over.  He said it was straight forward and spelled out everything in black and white.

The salary and benefits were all laid out and easy to understand with the term to be five years. They had offered me the choice of three houses to choose from all in upscale neighborhoods with great schools nearby.

I signed the contract and sent it Fed-X back to them. I must admit I was getting a little excited about the whole thing.

I notified Abby about the move but she never responded. I know she received it for she signed for it. She long ago had written herself out of our lives.

While it was not easy to grasp but the reality was; she had so immersed herself into other people’s problems she had no life of her own.

There was one more problem I had to deal with and that was Jessie’s nanny. She had insisted on calling her mommy when she was learning to talk and I never prompted her to stop it.

Our nanny was aware of what was going on and knew we would be leaving her.  I tried every way I knew to convince her to go with us but she had family here and her mother was almost bedridden at this stage. She said she would stay with her mother and already had several families that wanted her to work for them.

She said losing Jessie was almost too difficult to bear but she had gone through it with some other children in the last thirty years.

She said she had a young niece in Seattle where we were going and she had decided to be a nanny for she loved kids.

She said the girl had been a wild young thing growing up, but her sister assured her that was a thing of the past and she had settled down and could be trusted.  She wanted a full time position as a live in nanny.

Soon after, I called her mentioning that her aunt had given me her number.  I would like to meet her and might be interested if she proved to be the kind of person I wanted.

I must say I was impressed with her on the phone and her credentials were certainly impressive; three years of college and several part time jobs with sterling references from each.

I asked her why she wanted to live in and she said that was the way her Auntie did it but the real reason was it cost so much to live on her own.  

We agreed to meet in a couple of days and after Jessie had met her, I would make my decision.

The hardest part of this whole transaction was Jessie giving up her “Mommy.”  Our Nanny had raised Jeanie virtually from birth and I had to let her nanny deal with this for she understood “her baby” even better than me.

After explaining to Jessie that Nanny’s mother was ill, and she had to care for her and her niece would be taking her place; Jessie began to accept it as a fact of life and began to look forward to meeting her new nanny.

With that behind me I was ready to make our move. The movers came and were loaded up by the end of the day and pulled out for Seattle.

 

Jessie and I went directly to the airport caught our plane, and arrived in Seattle about ten that night.  A limo was waiting for us and took us to the hotel we were to stay at until our furniture arrived.

The next morning we met with Lacy for breakfast and they hit it off right away.  She looked to be perfect except for one thing. She was way too pretty for a live in nanny and I wasn’t sure how I felt about that but she met all the qualifications and was CPR certified.

One thing I knew was something was stirred that had been pretty well dormant since my divorce and it left me ill at ease.

After breakfast I asked Jessie how she felt about Lacy being her new nanny and living with us, hoping a bit that she would say she didn’t want her.

She said in Chinese, “She is wonderful.”

Lacy said, ‘What did she say?” for she heard me ask about her.

“I said you might have to learn Chinese but I’m sure Jessie will teach you.”

“You mean she likes me?”

“Most assuredly she does.”

I had to meet with the top officials of the company so I asked Lacy if she and Jessie would be alright till later this afternoon and she said, “Of course we will,” and Jessie said, “Of course we will.”

I said if they needed anything they could charge it to the room including some shopping at the hotel shops.

Two Secretaries

My meeting with the top men went well. They laid out what they expected from me and said I had my pick of secretaries and if I needed two just select the ones I wanted.

I went over the pool of secretaries and saw two were Chinese. I called them in one by one and found that both spoke the same dialect of Chinese I do.

I notified the head of the department and said these two are to be considered my private secretaries and paid as such.

I told the secretaries to set up my office as if I was Chinese and to only speak Chinese in our dealings unless an English speaking person was present.  I explained that my mind set must accommodate thinking as a person of Chinese culture.

I said this is difficult to explain, but they both said they understood and would help me with the proper words and accents.

I really felt good about how things went so far.

I picked up the car they provided for me and it was excellent, and superior to the one I sold before coming here.

I managed to get back to the hotel and have lunch with the girls and then it was time to meet the realtor to look at houses.  When we started looking at the three we had to choose from Lacy chimed in as one of the family, and Jessie wouldn’t leave her side.

The girls selected the house they were partial to, and the realtor said if we liked it, we could purchase it at a later date.  I could have been satisfied with any of the houses for they were all fine and upper class. 

 To be Continued