I had gone to a place in Florida where my father and my mother were living. I was just visiting, but was thinking of moving there and finding a job, even though I still had my law practice in Texas. My father had told me about a doctor who had a job-opening in his office, and I intended to see him. I began dressing and looked in the closet which was full of shirts. I saw some shirts with blue stripes, but wanting to be as conservative as possible, I picked out a solid blue one. After I had put the shirt on, and after my mother walked into the room, I realized the shirt was actually a black one which I had recently bought. The shirt was more casual than what I wanted. Also I was wearing brown shoes and a brown belt, although I had wanted to wear black shoes and a black belt. But it was already late, twenty-five till the hour, and I was supposed to be there at half past; so I decided what I was wearing looked all right, and I left.
The area outside reminded me of Fourth Street in Portsmouth near a place where I used to buy used comics when I had been a boy. It was only a block and a half to where I was going to go, which, if it had been in Portsmouth, would have been in the direction of downtown. I walked down the street, and then through an alley. I soon arrived at the doctor's office, which was in a small, modest, white house. I walked in and the doctor came out to meet me. He was a thin, lanky fellow about six feet tall, and was probably in his early 30s, younger than I expected. He somewhat resembled a Dallas attorney I knew named Terence.
I noticed a table in the room which had some small, stuffed animals on it. As we sat down, I also noticed a large pile of stuffed animals on the floor. I thought he and I must be very different because I didn't care about things like that. Yet something about him made me think we were similar in some ways. I wondered what kind of doctor he was. Something about the situation seemed rather strange.
As we began talking, I wondered if he would want me to do technical work. At first I thought he might want someone just to run errands for him, but after talking with him a while, I realized he just wanted someone to talk with his clients when they came in. It seemed he referred to the position as that of a "porter." I specifically asked him if he wanted someone who would be "affable." I thought if I did take the job I would strive to just be my natural self. But I told him that would be a very difficult job for me because I was lacking in communication skills. But when I began to feel that he thought I didn't want the job, I told him that I would like to have it, that I thought it would be interesting because I would like to improve my communication skills.
He told me that before he had become a doctor he had worked for someone else doing the same type of thing. I told him if he could afford to pay me for the job, then I would take it. Yet when I wondered how much he would be paying, I knew the pay was really not a factor in my deciding to work for him. I was unconcerned about the pay, but I was concerned about having flexible hours so I could come and go when I wanted, within reason. I knew I would be needed at certain times, but I wanted to be able to leave after I had finished what I needed to do.
The doctor was quite a robust fellow and seemed like a likable person. He had a couple of alcoholic drinks while I was with him, and he was smoking a cigarette. I knew I drank sometimes and thought I might drink with him sometime. During the interview he asked me what I had been doing. I told him I would have to return to Texas to wrap up my business there, for I still had 200 pending legal cases on which I was working. I told him that most of the cases were completed, although some things could still occur on them which would have to be attended to. I told him I had been in Texas 10 years. But I felt I would like to move to Florida. I felt there was something about Florida which was drawing me there.
He was sitting at a desk; I told him I wanted to be honest with him and tell him what I really wanted to do. I told him I wanted to write, and gradually began telling him how I wrote my dreams. I told him I had two portable computers and one large computer on which I wrote my dreams. I told him I already had volumes of dreams. I told him that what I did was unusual and that I knew of no one else who wanted to write books of dreams, although I did know of some people who wrote their dreams, because I thought of the "Dream Network Bulletin." But he didn't seem that interested in what I was saying about writing.
I was unsure he was going to hire me, but he asked me if I could come back the next day at 1 o'clock for lunch.
We walked onto the back porch, which was somewhat elevated above the ground. He hollered to someone in a group of people gathered around a pool below us.
***
I was sitting at a table with the doctor, his small, thin five year old son, and a couple women. The boy, a rather skittish little fellow who was sitting in a high-chair on my right, began telling me a story about his father, his "real" mother, and his "work" mother. His work mother was apparently a woman who took care of him at work. I paid close attention to him, trying to get the feel of who he was, until he was finally distracted by something else, and stopped talking. The room grew quiet until I focused attention back on him and encouraged him to continue. But he seemed so distracted he seemed to have forgotten what he was talking about and he couldn't remember.
I looked at one of the brown-haired women (about 30 years old) who was sitting across from me and I said, "You're the real mother."
She replied that she was the real mother. She was dressed plainly and was somewhat attractive. I had the feeling she wasn't yet sure whether she liked me. But I felt good sitting there with them. I hoped we wouldn't become angry with each other about something and have the anger last, because I wanted to get to know the family. I said, "I'm Steve. I already feel a strong affinity for everybody."
I began thinking I had once read a book about a situation similar to this. It was about someone who had lived with a family, had gotten to know them, and then had written a book about the family. I thought the book might have been The Great Gatsby. I tried to remember if Gatsby had been a porter. It seemed he might have, and I tried to remember the story line of the book.
Copyright 2009 by luciddreamer2k@gmail.com
