Ghost of Christmas Past

With it being the Christmas season and all, I thought I would share a story of a Christmas past...

When I moved back to Virginia from Florida in October of '85, I got a job as a night auditor at a Holiday Inn. Night Auditor is essentially the person that works through the night (11pm - 7am), is the manager on duty (usually you are the only person there, so you are in charge) and balances what the registers say was taken in to the actual cash on hand. I was always good at balancing the books, so the actual work took only a few hours and then I was free to do what I wanted...usually sleep. However...many interesting things can happen in a hotel overnight, so very often it was worth my while to stay up and be entertained by the goings on.

One evening in December, when the hotel lobby was beautifully decorated with a Christmas tree and about a hundred gorgeous poinsetta plants, I arrived at work a little early...around 10:45. A little after midnight, soon after the hotel bar had closed, as I was going about my usual work routine, a man approached the desk. He started talking to me but I thought the way he began the conversation was a little strange...

"What time did you start working tonight?" he queried.

I replied, "My shift started at eleven, but I was actually here a little before that."

"Yes...yes, it must be you," he said.

As I said, I thought this a little odd, but I was distracted with my work and didn't really give it much thought. The man continued on...

"Today is my wife's birthday," he said. "And I really wanted to do something special for her."

So, I'm figuring that he wanted to buy a nice bottle of champagne from the bar for her but had found that the bar was closed. I started to prepare myself to tell him that there was nothing I could do, as I wasn't legally allowed to sell alcohol and didn't have the keys to the bar in any case.

"When we got here, around ten till eleven, my wife looked around and was really impressed."

Okay...now I'm thinking that his wife has a December birthday so feels a sort of affinity for Poinsettia plants. I will say, the hotel had done a magnificient job decorating and the Poinsettias were the prettiest ones I had ever seen. I'm sure that I wasn't supposed to, and probably would get in trouble if anyone found out, but I was going to tell the guy he could take a plant or two for his wife...with best wishes for a happy birthday.

"So...what I'm trying to say...that is...what my wife really wants and I would like to give her for her birthday...is another man."

Say what! Guess I was young and naieve, but I really hadn't seen that coming. I explained that I was on duty and could not leave the desk unattended. He looked a little crestfallen and gave me their room number...in case I changed my mind...and then wandered off.

From that day to this, I have never regretted my decision to pass on this offer...but I do wonder sometimes if there would have been some sort of gift bow involved.