"The Penis and the Tree Stump" An excerpt from a novel by Julianna Rowe

 Property of Julianna Rowe

Chapter Twenty:  The Penis and the Tree Stump:  

The Greatest Salesman in the World

Our world had settled down since the custody ordeal.  The boys were in school, and I stayed home caring for little John and the other children while Roger worked, but money was an issue.  I had been confiding in a friend that we were falling behind financially. She suggested I go to the local employment agency and see about a job in sales.  My self-confidence was still dangling like a string frayed from my inability to truly see my own good reflection.   The picture I saw of myself had been taken from other people’s judgment, all who knew me not.  An avalanche of pain and generations of garbage had been brought into my world of innocence as a child and laid me in their mud at birth.  But that was about to change.

My friend continued to boost my self-esteem, and our financial troubles grew.  She called me after seeing an ad for sales in the local paper.  She watched little John, and I went in for an interview.  The very well-dressed gentleman was a sales representative for an insurance company out of Dallas, Texas.  He sold me his bill of goods, I bought it, and, on the spot, I hired myself.  He was shocked and told me I couldn’t do that.  I told him I just had, so when could I start.

My flight was paid for by “The Company.”  The training was in Dallas at the Twin Towers Insurance Building, where before entering was the most beautiful giant bronze statues of several horses running through magnificent fountains. The city was grandiose to me, considering I had been stuck in a little one-horse town USA Virginia, fighting with family demons while pregnant, not to mention moving across the country to get the privilege to do so.  Roger and my friend were tending to the children making this new positive challenge in my life less complicated than the norm.

The first day of class was vigorous, to say the least. The instructor's name was Ronnie West, and he was out to see, no, test us, then to see if we had what it took to make the company money.  I was the pretty little housewife, somewhat shy yet as tenacious and determined as he had ever seen.  At one point during class, he used me as an example in a staring down contest, a tactic used in closing a sale.  I won his challenge and heard tell I was one of the only people that ever had.  Take note, I can weather the storm or storm (training class, custody courtroom assaults, marriage, a new family, all in one year!) and then fall apart after the fact. Yes, I am a fall-apart-after-the-fact person.  I believe that was due to having to disassociate from mental pain all my life.  I was like a bottle of soda pop sitting on a quiet shelf that got knocked off repeatedly until its insides blew its lid off and exploded.  The one-time bubbly, sweet, tasting pop could finally offer no more and erupted like a volcano.  I did. I became dizzy, disorientated, and nauseated after dinner.   I returned to the Hotel room where friends from the class called Dallas 911, and I drifted out of site in an ambulance to the hospital.  They thought I had food poisoning, but I believe I had an anxiety attack.  I was so frightened of this new venture, afraid of failure again.  My life had been plagued with failures, along with the old tapes playing in my head saying I couldn’t do it.  Mummie dearest tapes had their own damn racetrack inside my head, and she still held the checkered flag. 

They kept me in the hospital overnight and part of the next day.  I laid in that bed alone that night, looking out over the beautiful, exquisite lights shimmering over the entire city like a trillion diamonds.  I always loved the big city lights but was so alone and frightened.  I knew I was stronger than wishing because wishes were merely little desires of the heart, but it takes the heart and the mind to connect before they can manifest into life. Yet there I was, missing my opportunity, missing class, and I was sure they would make me come back and do it over again later.

I had practiced memorizing my sales pitch for six weeks.  I studied it so hard that I would wake up dreaming about it.  I ate it, drank it, and dreamed about it more, and they let me pass the course due to my sheer enthusiasm.

I flew home on Friday and met with the team on Monday morning, where we worked the street store to store, door to door, floor to floor, until there “weren’t” no more!  We were taught there was no bad territory, only the bum in the territory.

I broke all sales records and loved it like my employer did.  I was finally distinguished, slashed felt redeemed for the first time in my life. Something I did on my own for a prestigious company that put on yearly conventions and quarterly affairs, all full of hoopla. The annual celebration was black tie and evening gowns.  The quarterly achievement gifts were out of this world, like the old days of some of the wealthiest pyramid meetings where prizes were something to achieve.  I personally won 24 Karat gold plated goblets, gold ware, plaques, diamond rings, and statues that imitated the golden globes.  Not to mention Sales Team of the year and Sales Person of the year. In fact, I was so revered for my excellence they walked me to and from my vehicle in terms of my safekeeping.  Obviously, I made them a lot of money. It was a joke yet somewhat reality.

During the training classes of the new salespeople, I was required to call in from the field to share how many policies I had sold that day and how to do it because when most salespeople quit and went home, I would find a grocery store or factory and get permission to see the employees one by one. I could convince the owners to allow me to use company time for my presentation.  I was best with Banks because I was not intimidated by any Banker. I knew I made as much money as they did, if not more. Men no longer intimidated me in the least.

You see, I was trained by the Greatest Salesman in the World, which is a fact.  Ronnie West had been named the greatest from his entry into a world sales contest he won.  He told the company I was a natural-born salesperson.  He was right.  I could sell ice to an Eskimo, but it was a grueling, never give up job because you are only as good as your last week’s sales.

I had a couple of scary encounters while selling in the country around Virginia and Eastern Kentucky.  Some mountain folks hadn’t entered the century I was living in, which showed its ugly “head” a few times. That would be a pun in the upcoming pages. My training taught me to never miss a store, a business, a home, or a man standing on the corner because all were prospective sales.  I was also taught to do what successful people told me to do, so I did, and on one stop, I saw a man sitting on a dead tree stump who appeared to be whittling, and behind him, a small boy about nine years of age tending some goats.  I had pulled up to a locked metal gate outside Red Oak, Kentucky, where I parked, got out, and gave a shout-out.

Hello there, I have something I believe will interest you, sir, as it has some of your neighbors.”

I waited, but no response.  And then I saw “it.”  A pink penis hanging outside his unzipped pants.  It was not a small penis, might I add, and not at any sort of erection state that I could tell even though I was a good thirty feet from where “it” was hanging low against the dead tree stump.  I always carried a small pistol, but it was not within reach.  The old man stood up with “it” still dangling about between his legs.

I responded to his no response, although I believe his response was apparent.

“Sir, I am looking for Highway 59 South. Could you point me in the proper direction, please?”

Obviously, that made no sense.  Why would that interest him, as it had his neighbors? He began walking toward the fence line gate where I could clearly see a grubby old man who had not bathed in months and whose eyes glistened like the devil was about to win a piece of me. Did I mention he was carrying a real live shotgun?  I still had enough wits about me to see him raise that gun high with pecker still hanging low. I put my sweet car in R and spit gravel about twenty feet in all directions.  If he did take a shot at me, the Kentucky dust bowl I had created would make his visibility zero.  And so, from then on, my little pearl-handled nine-millimeter would be lying on the seat next to me!

We usually traveled in teams. Met for coffee, split up on city streets to work the door-to-door sales, then back at four p.m. to meet for end-of-day transaction reports.  Sometimes worked the country farms and homes on the weekends because I was professionally driven. I liked getting attention for doing well because, during my life, that was not something I had ever gotten.

Roger had found a job at a factory as a quality control engineer. I had hired a young Indian woman named Betty to care for the children.   The kids loved her because she gave them one-on-one while I was out trying to outwit the ghosts of Crestview. Or should I say I was growing up getting what I never got as a kid?  The boys still remember Betty.  She had anxiety and would run for a long time when it hit.  Kind of like Forest Gump but only around the yard where she could still see the boys.  She taught them about food, Indian food.  I am talking cowboy and Indian-type Indian. Need I say I didn’t have to worry about the children, which left me ample time to sell, and I did.

I have one other Insurance sales story that could have put me in a compromising situation and did. 

I was working in an apartment building from a referral that always brought good sales, and because I knew if I could sell one, the rest of the apartment dwellers would fall like dominos. So, I knocked on the outside door of Unit 5.  A young man answered who seemed very friendly.  I told him John Sever, one of his co-workers at the Piggly Wiggly, had given me his name, and I felt I had something that would also interest him.  He invited me in and ushered me to his black velour sofa with the enormous black velvet Elvis picture behind it.  Yes, I had my nine-millimeter in my purse next to me as always since the stump man incident. Clyde was seated in the chair to the right of me. There was a coffee table and a wall to the left side of me.  The exit door was behind Clyde.  I knew better, and not only that, but I had told no one where I was going, which was very unusual for me.  This one slipped by me somehow, and it was too late.  I had gotten caught up in the role of the excellent sale versus the use of sound judgment.

We chatted briefly, and then I gave him my sales pitch.  And then he gave me his! How he had always wanted a woman to watch him masturbate, at which time he wasted no time in undoing his zipper and pulling down his pants.

I had a gun, but I was frozen.  Anyway, would I shoot him?  He was a mere two feet from me and my portfolio of sales.  That was not what I was selling, Mr. Clyde.  I knew enough to know this could go downhill fast if I didn’t think of something. Meantime he is Rolfing his sadly limp dick diligently while I watch.  I was afraid to make eye contact versus eye-to-penis contact so I began talking to him while I watched him try to masturbate, which wasn’t going well.  DING DING DING. I asked him if he had gone to church.  Nothing like diving right in.  I talked to him like he wasn’t doing what he was doing while I watched what he was doing. I mentioned a couple of God experiences I had while meeting different types of people in my travels and a few of my personal stories as he finished his “always wanted to masturbate in front of a woman” fantasy.

He put his head down and cried, but I didn’t feel safe.   He continued to apologize and said he believed in God as well.  I took a chance and stood up to leave, showing confidence and stature, telling him I would check back with him regarding his need for the policy.  He walked me to the door, where we said our goodbyes and I drove away.  As I look back, he would have signed on the dotted line!!  Okay, I am just kidding, maybe.