I had COVID-19 and was off work all last week, so I was a little bit weak when I started back to work at the Welcome Center yesterday. Today was my day to work at the Noble House and it was raining, so there were two possibilities for how my day might go. It could either be quiet because no one was out in the rain, or it could be busy because everyone wanted to do something indoors. I was hoping it would be quiet.

Mark drove me to work this morning and walked me up to the door with an umbrella. I got in, turned on the lights, unlocked the door, and did some opening paperwork, and then a family of six opened the door and came in for a tour. Shortly after I started with them, four more people showed up, and so it began. I call these revolving tours, tours where I start with one group, another group comes in late, and when I take them back later to show them what they missed, another group comes in. It’s like going around a revolving door, constantly picking up new people, and dropping off others at every turn. I’ve had these kinds of days before, so I’m used to them. My boss, Laurie, likes to have me work on Tuesdays and Saturdays because those are our busiest days and I seem best able to handle them.

However, this morning I was looking out at a sea of faces at one point and thought, “I need help!” We were in the sitting room which is the largest room in the house and I had sixteen people in front of me. I did a quick calculation and realized that there wasn’t room enough upstairs for sixteen people, so I texted my boss and asked if she was available to help. This being Tuesday, she was in her office next door, so she came over, got one look at the group, and jumped in to help. We divided them in half so that I could take half the people upstairs and she could talk with the other half downstairs. Then we switched.

Around 1:00, there was a lull in the crowd so she and I chatted for a few minutes in the staff room while I started eating my sandwich, but I hadn’t even gotten halfway through my sandwich when another family came in. Laurie had planned to meet with someone, so she went back to her office for a while. A short time later, I had to text her and ask if she could come back because the house was full again. The last couple didn’t leave until 3:20 (we usually close at 3:00), but Laurie brought the open signs in and closed the doors before I was through so that no one else would come in.

When the last couple left, I locked the door behind them and went upstairs to turn out the lights. Mark had already come to pick me up and he was waiting for me in the staff room. Laurie was turning the lights off downstairs. I came into the kitchen to close the last door in preparation for the ghost tours this evening and I was so exhausted that I tripped over my own feet and fell. That was embarrassing! I gathered up the money that people had left as donations for the repair of our porch and Laurie started counting the money from entrance fees – $5/person. It had been so busy that I hadn’t had time to mark down everyone that came in, and sometimes I put their fees in my pocket because I didn’t have time to go back and take care of it, so when I gave her everything I had, I was eager to hear how much money had come in the form of fees. That would tell me how many people had come to visit today. When Laurie counted the money and divided it by five, it turned out that I had had 62 visitors today. The most we have ever had in a day before is 40, and that has only happened maybe once or twice in the years I’ve been working there. Laurie, Mark, and I were floored! Sometimes in the evening, when the trolley company brings busloads of people to the house for a ghost tour, we’ll get three busses with 20 people each on the bus, but the docent only has to do the downstairs floor and the people are in and out within half an hour. Laurie looked at me and said, “You essentially did three bus tours in a five-hour day!” She said no one had ever had that many people during the daytime tours before.

I was so glad that Mark had come to pick me up. It gave me time to eat more of my lunch, and I don’t think I would have made it home if I had had to drive… I was that tired! Mark made me lie down for a while after we got home but I was too jazzed to sleep. Thankfully, I have the next two days off work to rest up!