Patricia M. (1959-2005)

  

A six foot farm girl from Clayton County,

she was steered by ambitious older siblings

and grew up immersed in duty;

whether chores, basketball or studies,

she was a person who took careful notes,

considered each detail from both ends

and aimed to correct every error.

As an earnest trainee at our office,

too modest to recognize her own gifts

and entirely unaware of her beauty,

she was everyone’s favorite apprentice,

guided by surrogate brothers and sisters,

though the office aunties had no help

as several long term romances fizzled.

Her approach to the job was pure Iowa,

careful stewardship and steady yields,

but her results got little notice,

and when the avalanche of layoffs came,

revealing her name on the wrong list,

Patty called it a blessing and a new start,

and set off for a future in the Cities.

In due time there was a wedding,

her groom gamely bearing the scrutiny

of her protecting host of family and admirers.

Each year the cards and messages arrived

from the woman who never forgot her friends;

then suddenly, it was that July afternoon,

the secret treason of a damaged heart,

and what remained was grief.

Francis X. O’Reilly

IBM Branch Office 097, 1975

Our sales team leader was six foot leprechaun

with blue eyes, white hair and a red nose,

whose idea of customer entertainment

leaned to scotch and stag movies,

but observed certain fixed principles.

His jacket was never unbuttoned

and he never left the office without his hat.

However, FX was rarely away from his desk.

He did the planning and we did the work,

his name never attached to any assigned duty.

Wagging a piece of chalk like a baton,

he directed the weekly review meeting,

bemoaning the fate of his excellent strategies

in the hands of such a clumsy bunch.

In good years, befitting his rank,

he was equipped with an acolyte or two,

and fist wrapped around the receiver,

he would repeat the answers out loud

while one of us took detailed notes.

In leaner times, dignity had to be shelved,

and he would reluctantly search for a pencil.

Francis hated efficiency and measurements,

an excuse to hire accountants,

those parasites on the body corporate,

and counseled us that management and clients

had little (if any) need to know.

He believed in the founding gospel of Watson,

the magic combination of sales and man,

and never wavered, a proud fossil to the end.

(A memory of the early days in my 34 years at IBM)