Hiring Isabel

Isabel came to see me again yesterday. "Kris, I need to talk to you," she said.

As it turns out, she is now in need of a new bicycle, and therefore, is also in need of “a job” for the summer. She told me her daddy had said that he would hire her and increase her allowance from ten dollars a month to fifteen if she talked with me first and I approved it.

And so the interviewing process began. We determined that she knows how to type. No, she’s not very fast, but she does know her letters, and she does know how to spell! I thought we probably would need someone that could type just a little faster than that.

“Well, at least I know how to type!” she said, exasperated at my lack of enthusiasm. “I don’t see why they can’t make keyboards with the keys in alphabetical order!”

I drive a pretty hard bargain, so we went on to explore other possible positions. I told her that unfortunately, with no marketable skills, all I could hire her for was for cleaning duties. That did not appeal to her at all. The job she was really seeking, she said, was that of being a Desk Cleaner-Upper. A Desk Cleaner-Upper is someone who picks up paper clips and straightens up pens, and lines the scotch tape up with the stapler. She proceeded to show me how it was done. Oh. Nice, but I didn’t think it was very practical. I didn’t want my pens disappearing out from under my nose.

So back to the cleaning duties we went. I told her I would hire her to take care of kitchen duty, lobby duty, and bathroom duty. “I don’t do bathrooms,” said Isabel.

“Then I’m not interested in hiring you,” I told her.

“Well, ok,” she finally gave in. “But I won’t do the patient bathroom–just the bathroom in Dad’s office.” Nope. Not acceptable.

“That’s the one we absolutely must have cleaned,” I said.

She gave up a howl of protest: “I would have to call the police if you made me wipe up pee that’s not my own! Please!!”

In the end, we settled for her cleaning the lobby, watering the plants, and cleaning the kitchen every day for the rest of the summer. At $5 per month, I thought it was a deal we could live with. “Alright. Go get started,” I said. And off she trotted.

No more than ten minutes passed before Miss Isabel was back in my office informing me of the weeks she would need off. “Don’t make me fire you before I hire you,” I said. She giggled a little bit, relinquished her days off plan, then went off to resume her cleaning duties.

I looked up a bit later and found her washing the glass of the grandfather clock with the furniture polish.

This arrangement is going to need an adjustment or two.