In December I wrote November 30, 2013, on a clean sheet of paper before I went to see Della Keene. The date looked oddly formal without a column or a heading around it. I had considered carrying a list of reasons, but reasons were what I usually brought when I wanted another extension. I folded the sheet once and put it in my pocket, where I could feel its edge while I waited outside her door.
Della had a stack of work beside her and a pen with its cap between her teeth. She put the cap down when I asked for a few minutes. I took the chair rather than standing in the doorway as if this were a question she could settle quickly. "I intend to leave November thirtieth next year," I said. "I want us to use the time before then to make the handoff work."
She looked at the calendar, then back at me. "That's a firm date?" I said it was. She asked whether something had happened, and I told her nothing new had happened. Saying that mattered. I did not want to make my departure sound like an emergency that could be cured by a few easier weeks. I wanted to leave while I was still capable of doing the work well.
"We can't assume the guide answers everything," she said.
"I don't assume that. We need people to try it while I'm here. We need time for the questions it doesn't answer." I unfolded the paper and set it on her desk. Beneath the date I had written three plain items: finish the draft, try the work without me leading, correct what fails. I had resisted adding a fourth item promising to remain available afterward.
Della read the list. "There may still be questions after you go."
"There will be," I said. "I'd rather we find out how to handle them than make my telephone the last page of the guide." She smiled a little, but I could see she was considering the practical loss. She asked about work that only I remembered, and I said that was precisely the work we needed to identify. I could help expose the dependence; I could not call it a good arrangement simply because I was accustomed to it.
We agreed to begin with ordinary tasks instead of waiting for a perfectly organized binder. Della kept the sheet, and I copied the date into my own calendar when I returned to my desk. Nothing about the room changed. People still brought me questions that afternoon. But I answered one by showing where to find the record, and waited while the person found it, though doing it myself would have been quicker.
At the garage that weekend, Otis listened without touching the small notebook beside his elbow. I gave him the same date, not a softened version with room at either end. "November thirtieth," he repeated. "And if they aren't ready?" I told him readiness was the work I was offering during the months before it. I could not make a promise to him that vanished whenever somebody else was inconvenienced.
He opened the notebook. On one page he had listed what we owned; on the next, what we might need. Several entries had a line through them. He showed me a larger piece of equipment he had decided we could do without. "We start with repairs we can actually take," he said. "Not a building full of things we bought because we wanted to look established."
I had been saving a picture in my mind of a tidy workroom with matching storage and enough space to accept anything brought through the door. Looking at his crossed-out list, I recognized another way I could make a modest plan too large to begin. I took the pencil he offered and crossed out a purchase of my own. We agreed not to put all our savings into proving that the venture was serious.
"I'll start looking again," Otis said. "Looking isn't buying. And a date on your calendar isn't the same as leaving."
"I know." He slid the notebook between us rather than closing it. We spent the rest of the afternoon choosing which repairs we could begin with and which we would turn away. For once, refusing work belonged to the plan instead of being evidence that the plan had failed. Before I went home, he wrote the date at the top of a fresh page and left room beneath it for what we actually did.