The nonpayment payment

We have had a lot of interesting individuals come through our Shop door over the years. Some, you had trouble getting money out of them. Not all of those guys were out to con you, though.

One fella in particular, I'll call him Cloyce just to give him a name, has been on open account for better than forty years now. He's slow to pay but he always, eventually, pays. He's a genuinely good guy too. I think he's just undisciplined, kinda the way a kid is undisciplined. The kid means well yet doesn't quite understand how things should work.

A habit of Cloyce's has been to bring a check to pay his bill but then post date it. "Can you hold this for a week, Bill?" he would ask me Pops on presentation of the scrap of at that point worthless paper. And Dad would hold it, knowing that it would be good sometime within the next three weeks.

He's done that to me too. I deal with it because I know Cloyce means well, and also because I genuinely like him. As I say, it's not unfair to say he's almost confusedly childlike in his approach to life. There's a part of me which finds that quaint, or even endearing.

Still, getting paid is why we work. Back in September Cloyce came in and gave me a post dated check, asking me to hold it for a few days. I said yes but added, "You know, Cloyce, paying me today with a check I can't cash today really isn't paying me today." Cloyce nodded, and I could I could almost see that light bulb brightening above his head.

Cloyce stopped by the old barn this past Tuesday to pay his current bill. He wrote out a check. "Look, Marty, I dated it today," he showed me.

"Great, Cloyce, Thanks," I replied.

He then asked, "Can you hold it til Friday?"

Yes, I can hold it til Friday. I actually wonder whether that's his way of making himself pay me, to know in his own mind that a check is out there that he has to, some day, honor. Whatever the reason, I'll surely have my money later this afternoon.