Happy Birthday Gemini

Well today is Memorial Day. The end of this week is my best friend from my teen years birthday and on Sunday will be my husband Brian's.

Funny they are both Gemini. Some words I found that describe them energetic, clever, witty and imagintive.

So most of you know Brian: And if clever and witty isn't that his middle name not sure what is. I also read one of their traits is that they can talk and talk and talk. Well if that is not Brian. Sometimes I am amazed at how much he has to say when we are out with others. And I read that Gemini's make for interesting and exciting friends. We certainly never have a dull moment.

And when I was a teen I worked with this guy Keith. He started working with me on his 16th birthday. For some reason it was a family tradition to work for Eckerd's. His big sister Lisa had made quite a name for herself in the company. Youngest assistant manager, youngest store manager and a girl. This was the early 1980's. Later I would also work with his younger brother Jeff. All of which are friends forever.

Don't know who started it but Keith was referred to as "Cool Keith". Oh if you didn't know him in the 80's he started off with the clean cut look that he has today but then after high school the hair started growing and growing. This was the days of the Hair Bands. Keith had the look. I mean "Cool Keith". Oh and he had the car a 1979? Trans Am. gold of course. Nothing too flashy. Not. I did get to drive it a few times. Once right after it had been painted he had me take it to my house so it would not get scratched in the parking lot while he worked. Those guys and their cars. Oh well I did have a Mustang II and Steve had a Duster. Those were the days. Girls loved that Cool Keith. The hair the car all of it. They would be jealous because of our friendship. That is all it ever was. But it was the best. We both knew we were like siblings.

We both got the chance to work at a tiny AM radio station together in our late teens early 20's. Another dream job. Not very glamourous but it was a fun experience.
 Keith and I were the fastest friends.. I could never have imagined when I met him. I remember him learning how to turn off the lights in the store. My god this kid was full of energy. Really kid next I will teach you how to sweep the floor. How could he get excited over learning how to switch off breakers. You know I was a whole 9 months older than him. We worked together for about 2 years. He and I closed most nights. Midnight back then and got up in the morning and went to school.  How many teens do you know that worked whenever they could. Overtime was a given when available. He and I would pay each other to work when we wanted off like it was a game. Straightening the store and goofing off were one in the same. Everything was a game or a race. Who could do it faster, better and with the least mistakes. And when I say mistakes I mean not catch whatever the other did to stand in the way of your prerfection. We would walk through the other's aisles and see something out of place and think, "He will never find that." and smile. Knowing that at the end of the night we would check each others work and be thrilled to find that they did miss whatever it was. The more out of place the better. The more it mixed in the happier we were.

We would look at the list left for us in the evening and decide a time which we would complete the list by and meet in the pharmacy waiting area and then decide how long we could hide and not get called to the register or not be spotted by the assistant manager.

One time someone had put a greeting card that played happy birthday in the baler and everytime you went in the back room you would hear it over and over until we had to make a bale to get it out of there. The best and stupidest story well I have 2 stupid bale stories. When I was pretty young and I have the scar to show for it. If you couldn't roll the top part from one side to the other you would push down whatever was stopping it with one arm and pull with the other. Putting one arm in the way of the metal rollers. Get the idea. My one arm got caught in the metal roller and did it leave a mark. And the oh so caring assistant told me something along the lines of guess you won't do that again. But one night Keith was hiding from work and had climbed inside the baler and pulled the smashing part over the top of himself part way of course so that the saftey release was still pushed in and it would not go down. I scared him to death by pressing the button which just made a sound but he came jumping out. We had to be crazy right.

Now I know this all sounds like fun and games but there was a lot of putting away shoes and filling combi loungers and my god the coolers. I think then we may have had 8 doors. We couldn't keep them filled to save our lives. This was Clearwater Beach  in the 80's. Our Saturday's were fill the chairs, fill the coolers, fill the shoes, fill the chairs again and set the ad. Don't forget whomever was doomed to the register was trapped in a cage. At first everyone has to run the register but as you had been there for a while you could find your freedom in the store. Freedom to work until you could not work anymore. But in the same right you could play until you got caught. Did I mention everything was a game. We were teenagers. It wasn't just me and Keith but Steve, Margie, Karen, Nelson, Shawn, Kim, Valerie, Cindy, Tracy and the God Father to all of us, Frank.

Frank taught us everything we know about retail and I am sure the lot of us know quite a bit about it even if we never straighten a shelf for pay again in our lives. We know that he knew how to make that store run like a well oiled machine and he could do it all from the parking meter out front with a cigarette in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other. Later after I had been there a while he would joke that I was the worst employee he ever had. Well I had never worked before in a store and his way of teaching was not exactly the hand holding type. It was more do it right or don't do it at all. Even if you have no idea how the right way to do it is. You will figure it out quick or you got yelled at again.

Oh the best Frank story I have is the day we found out that he was getting transferred and Keith's sister Lisa was going to be the new manager. I was devistated. I did not know Lisa at the time except for that she was his sister but I knew that meant Keith and I could not work together anymore at that store. Siblings could not work together. So I knew he would be transferred as well. I was so sad. I cried. Frank and I were standing out back and I was crying and he was smoking and he said can just one of those tears be for me. I smiled and said yeah I guess.

All the friendships from then that I still have I cherish. I don't imagine any of us will ever have the fun we had then. We even knew it was fun then. And not many kids today or even back then realize the friends they make at their first jobs are better than friends from school and the influences they have on your life (I do not still have any friends from school) but friends from Eckerd I can count them name them and now we have all been friends for more than 20 years almost pushing 30 and remember resets and floor cleaning and making bales and filling shoes with a smile on my face.  Not always a smile when doing shoes but when you were teaching someone new how to do it and could walk away. That was when we smiled. 15 boxes of shoes. Have them all put up and straightened. See you later I will be back in the pharmacy hiding from this real work.

Now I wanted this blog to be about my friend Keith  and our friendship but I see there was a lot that made Keith and I friends. All of the funny stories which had to do with working together. But I also realized that this is about lasting relationships. Of the people I listed earlier and me 4 of us married someone we met working with them at Eckerd. Margie married Scott, Cindy married Frank, Lisa married Erik and I married Brian.

So I am tying this back to what Brian and Keith have in common. The day I met Brian was 7 years to the day after I had met Keith. I met Brian in the back room of the same Eckerd.  It was his first day working in the same Clearwater Beach store. Hired by my dear friend Lisa (Keith's sister). Funny thing Brian had a rat tail hanging off the back of his head and Lisa had recommended that he lose it before he started working. I promise I would not looked twice at a guy with a rat tail.  Next day Lisa tells him he cleans up pretty good. I come in to visit my friend Lisa and here is this new guy who is a smart ass, know it all and I start talking to him. A few days later would be his birthday and we went out and played a game of darts together. This Brian guy and I were friends right away. Like nothing I had seen in a long time. And 5 years later we were married. Funny how fate and Eckerd brought all of us together.

So today I say Happy Birthday Keith. My dear friend. Whom I never talk to but feel as close to as the days we worked together and got ice cream at Howard Johnson's with Steve and Margie after work and the day you and Steve pulled the ladder out from under me up on top the office where the paper supplies were. I smile anytime I tell an Eckerd story and think of the fun and the work and how we learned to do both really well together.  And I think of the fate and magic how the stars had to align for all of us to meet and work together and become friends and some of us got married and even had kids. All started with two teenagers meeting in May of 1984. Amazing.

Happy Birthday Keith and Brian. Love you both.