I Was Born in a Small Town

My right front tire got progressively lower. I'd fill it; it would begin to empty itself. With travel plans in the works for this past weekend, I had to get something done. Unfortunately, I was in a Kiss-the-Pig contest, results to be announced at last Thursday's basketball game, and had other obligations the next night. When was I going to have enough time away from work to get to my town, get the tire taken care of, and get back to the school?

On impulse, I ran out of my room after the first custodian I saw Thursday morning. Custodians always know things.

"Where would you take a car with a leaky front tire?"

He told me of the local co-op (which I'd never used and didn't think I could--aren't those private sorts of things?), which wasn't what I was expecting. I was expecting something in my bigger town--not something in this no-stoplight even-smaller town. I hesitated, questioned further, and his response was, "Well, get it fixed or get a new tire."

Yes. Indeed. I'm not a big fan of brusqueness.

A few minutes later, he showed up at my door.

"Do you want me to take your car over there? K [also on custodial staff] is here, so we could do it."

A) Control freak. I'm sure that of all the people, our maintenance/custodial guys are capable of driving cars, but still...

B) Germ freak. Custodial staff. Trash cans. Emptied. Stuff falls out. Stuff gets put back in. I don't see our custodians (wonderful as they are!) walking around with sinks on backpacks. What's on the floor would be on my keys...and in my car...my car...my nice little haven...

I asked if I could get back to him in a couple of minutes.

I called a tire place in my bigger small town and was told they could probably get me in the next afternoon. But then, I figured, the necessary time would depend on the extent of repairs--and what if they needed to keep it over the weekend? That wouldn't work with my other plans. I went in search of my custodian.

It turned out that I could be out of my room for a few minutes, so I could drive my car to the co-op and he would take me back to school. Then along came K, who happened to be going that way anyway. He followed me over and waited while I ran my keys inside. I told the man behind the counter that I teach at the school and was told by my custodial staff that the co-op was the place to go for tire repairs. I asked if the shop would call me when my tire was done; the man told me they could drop it off at school for me.

Seriously?

A few hours later, a very tall man walked into my study hall and handed me my keys and my bill. He said I could stop over at four to pay it. As he left, I looked at it--$8.40.

Seriously?

Labor and delivery for less than nine bucks?

When I went back at four, I wanted to pay them more out of gratitude. Didn't, but wanted to. It was a different man behind the counter this time. I hadn't even told him my name but referred to myself as the one who had the leaky tire (turned out to be a nail); he said, "Oh--I've heard about you!"

Really. When working in a school system, that's not always a good thing.

He told me his daughters' names, and I realized that they're two who are incredibly personable and kind young ladies. The younger one, now that she has me as a teacher, gets off her school bus to hang out with me while I have bus duty twice a week.

He told me that the co-op does repairs for a lot of the teachers, and even some of the students. They'll pick up cars from our parking lot and return them, all taken care of.

Really?

This is what I like about small towns.