It was November and the air outside was already beyond feeling like fall, the sky was a gray overcast and this was the day that I was going to start my new position. I was a little nervous, however that all changed as I was welcomed by the whole staff at the store. Most of them knew me from when I would come to sell for the meat company. Training went well and after the first day I felt very good about the change that I had made. I learned everything that I could soaking up all of the information that I could. I lot of the stuff that had to be done around the stores came back to me as I had learned some thirty years earlier as a boy working in the different grocery stores before I went into the Marine Corps. As the weeks went on I would see some of the route salesmen from the meat company and we would talk and I would think back to better times when I worked there. Now, however, I was doing something I also liked running a grocery business.
After a few months I received a call from the region manager of the meat company. He wanted to meet for lunch and I agreed. The next day I met with him and he told me that he wanted me back. He said that there was a branch managers position open that would be just right for me. The branch was located in Iowa. We I guess I was surprised that he would come and take me to lunch and offer me a position, a position that I had worked so hard to try and get before. I told him that I would have to discuss this with Darlene.
We went outside and sat on the porch swing of our new home. The home was our dream home, made of logs and sitting on almost an acre. We had only been living there for six months and this was going to be a tough choice to make. We talked it over with our children and we all agreed that this was something that I wanted. So I went for it. I gave my two weeks notice and I left the grocery chain and went back to the meat company.
