Married with children. Closeted in a predictable, somewhat sterile, suburbia.
It was a sudden overabundance of dental bills that pushed me over the edge.
I’d been living off the father of my children for a very long time. My youngest child had finally entered school, ending my excuse to pursue interests like creative writing as the stay-at-home parent. But how could I repay this father of my children when my earning capacity had shrunk to one quarter of his?
Finally it hit me: What I could contribute, that he could not without abandoning his lucrative career, was free air travel. Since my partner was loath to squander money on vacations, this could be liberating. I could give him (and myself and our children) the world.
My first day at “res” (reservations) I snaked my way down a long corridor, hearing the multitude of voices at my destination long before I could see anyone:
“Please allow me to confirm, Madam, that you’ll be on Flight #304 from New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport to Washington’s Ronald Reagan National Airport, departing at 11:45 a.m. and arriving at…”
Though this was the closest and clearest voice, I could tell that all were immaculately polished and professional.
I turned the final corner and could see the speaker still confirming “Madam’s” flight to Washington, DC. He was barefoot, scantily dressed in the rattiest of ratty bathrobes, and apparently engaged in some sort of sexual activity with the woman next to him who was offering her customer on the phone a choice of departure times for travel to San Francisco. The reservations agent next to her was lifting weights. The next two agents were practicing yoga.
As weeks morphed into months, especially after a price war with a competing airlines resulted in mandatory overtime, I understood the need for something…anything…more than forever repeating flight information.
Occasionally an irate would liven the place up. But at least the illusion of true relief came from the ever-faithful, self-proclaimed and self-named Big Jim.
There was something about the way the calls came in and the interruption in the otherwise monotonous drone that pricked even the exhausted ear. You could hear that irate who kept hanging up on us coming through the rows to you like a wave. If your timing was impeccable you could even drag out your previous call just enough so that irate would skip right over you to the next person. But Big Jim was another matter.
Someone in the far corner would yell out “Big Jim,” and the game was on. Women would practice their put-down lines with the people next to them. Men would answer in falsetto so they could also have a crack at Big Jim. Passengers got hung up on in the midst of purchasing tickets lest someone miss their shot. Mimicking the Olympic scoring of the time, people surrounding the person talking to Big Jim would hold up pieces of paper with things like “7.3” written on them. Whether the severity of the rank, the sarcasm of the delivery, or the speed before hanging up should score highest was hotly debated. Big Jim, our dearly beloved obscene phone caller, loved it all.
But the day dawned when I…worrying about how I was ever going to put my kids through college so they would never have to work a job like mine…lost even my gallows humor. I thought I’d stalled my last call sufficiently and was pissed as hell when I got Big Jim anyway. I lost it. I lit into him, recounting with mega-decibels every rotten thing that ever happened to me. When I was finally done I refused to help him get his rocks off so I did not hang up.
There was a long and very pregnant pause, with even the res agents around me putting their calls on hold to watch me warily, muttering about things like the psych ward at Bellevue. Then Big Jim lit into me, starting with, “Look, lady, I’m just trying to get me rocks off.” He went on to describe every rotten thing that ever happened to him in his life. Turns out he was clinically obese, had never had a girlfriend, and had lost his job. Then, as he’d done a million times before, he asked me how big my tits were. I feigned surprise and indignation and hung up on him. It was the least I could do.
