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Monday, January 25, 2021

Rant #2,578: It's a Miracle



It’s a miracle.
 
A few things happened late last week into the weekend that were simply a miracle in my view.
 
First off, my mother received here coronavirus vaccine shot on late Thursday afternoon, which, if you have been reading about what is going on in New York State related to the vaccine, is a miracle in itself.
 
She got her shot in spite of thousands of other such appointments being canceled because of the lack of vaccine availability.
 
I checked all day to make sure that her appointment was still on, it was, and she got her shot as scheduled, with the next one slated for February 11.
 
And come hell or high water or a blizzard or whatever faces us, she will be there to get her shot that day.
 
On Friday, she told me that she was very tired, and pretty much slept the entire day away. She also did not have much of an appetite, either.
 
But by Friday evening, my mother had pretty much returned to normal, so the after effects of such a shot were pretty minimal on her, thank goodness.
 
She still needs the second shot, of course, and we will see how that goes, but right now, everything is copacetic.
 
The second miracle that came to our family involved my son, who had worked in a seasonal job for the past two and a half months but found himself unemployed on Friday as the job presumably had ended.
 
He worked on the day, said his goodbyes, and he moved on from this job knowing that he did well in this position.
 
The funny thing about this is that he was never told by anyone there that his job had ended.
 
When he had no work days for the coming week, I even asked him to go back in to the store he was working in to find out what was going on, but his manager wasn’t there, and he was told that he had to call the store the next day to find out what was happening.
 
We called the store the next day, and his manager was still out. I spoke to someone there, who I presumed was an assistant manager, and she told me that yes, in fact my son’s job was a seasonal one and had come to an end.
 
I asked her if there was any possibility that my on could stay on in any capacity, because he really enjoyed his job, and she told me that I had to call someone else, who would be in later in the day.
 
I did this, and the woman told me that my son’s job had ended, as it was seasonal in nature.
 
As for future employment, I was told that I would have to speak to the store manager, but the entire management team of the store was out with COVID. They were all expected back by this coming Friday, and I could speak to them then.
 
And that was that.
 
My son, my wife and I had moved on from this job, and we were looking to the future.
 
In the interim, we somehow made a phone appointment for a position somewhere else slated for Wednesday morning, and we set our sights on getting my on a job as quickly as possible.
 
On late Saturday afternoon, as I always do on the weekend, I went out to get my family dinner. While I was in the car, I received a phone call, and it was from his store—and they asked me if my son could work this coming Sunday afternoon and the next Saturday afternoon.
 
After being surprised out of my socks about this request, I said “YES!” and after thanking them for calling, I called my wife and spoke to my son and told him the good news.
 
I still cannot believe that they called him to come back to work, but they did, and we are happy about that … no, not happy, but ecstatic!
 
There is a caveat, though, that we are going to have to address.
 
My son has to work Saturday afternoon, which normally would be fine, but in his case, it creates a problem.
 
He has his bowling league on Saturday, and he cannot do his job and go to his league at the same time.
 
We were just going to count it as a day off from the league this coming Saturday, and if he could, he could do his bowling at another time, and thus, will only miss the league by not being there, not from actually not bowling.
 
But we were happy and a little betwixt and between yesterday afternoon, when my son found out that he would not only be working this coming Saturday, and also on Sunday … but also on the following Saturday afternoon, which would mean another bowling day missed.
 
His bowling league is extremely important to him and his social well being. It is a league set up for people with disabilities of all stripes. It is among the few social activities he participates in—along with his Friday night basketball league—and we found out just how important it was to him when, for several months, such leagues were canceled due to the pandemic.
 
For him to miss two Saturdays is not beneficial to his social well being.
 
When he first started this job, it was with an understanding by the store that he could not work on Saturday afternoon during bowling season. He could work any other time of the week, but not that time. He could work on Saturday, but earlier or later, but not in the afternoon.
 
We are overjoyed that he is still working, but we are going to have to alert the store that he cannot work on Saturday afternoon again. I mean, he cold work once in a while during that time, but it cannot be part of his regular schedule.
 
Believe me, my wife and I are having a lot of trepidation related to this request, because it almost appears as if we are looking a gift horse in the mouth, so to speak.
 
We thought his job was over and done with, but now that he has it again, we have to make a major request of the store, and we would prefer if we didn’t have to do so, but we do. That is how important his bowling league is to our son’s ultimate well being and quality of life.
 
So later this week, when the management team is back in place I am going to have to make that request. I hate to do it, and I hope they can accommodate that request.
 
If not … well, we will cross that bridge when we come to it.
 
So to sum it all up, yes, miracles do happen … and to have two miracles happen in our family during the period of just a few days really is … well … a miracle.
 
Hopefully, we can fine-tune the second one of those miracles in the coming week.
 
Wish us luck. I hope that we do not need another miracle to do that. 

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