Funny How Life Works…

Well after months of agony it is finally over. I feel like it came right as I was about to hit rock bottom. I found out today that I have been accepted into the Teach For America 2013 Corps. No words can express how happy, excited , nervous etc I am right now . This also means I can start sleeping like a normal person again ( major plus). No words can express how grateful I am for my family and friends who supported me through the tears, bitching and downright depressing moments.  Granted I probably should have started this blog earlier…But I have about a month more of shenanigans I can document before I step out into the world beyond the deli counter.  

Chaos Ensues: April 15th-16th

To sum things up: today was chaotic. Jerry ( my boss) has been gone for two days now due to some health issues. Now this wouldn’t be a huge issue if we weren’t understaffed and under trained… but unfortunately we are. Thank god the kitchen staff was able to stomach helping us all day; I don’t know how we would have made it otherwise. I swear I do not want to see another catering tray or party platter for at least twenty-four hours. On the plus side, the people I worked with today were pretty awesome. It makes time go by so much faster when you can work and talk with your friends.

But tensions were still palpable. Upper management has looked so stressed and frustrated these past few days that  I worry something is going to go down. Gossip keeps flying between managers and general staff about my department and our current issues. It really makes the work environment  awkward on a daily basis. I wish I had more interesting things to write about lately, however, I have been so exhausted that writing seems like a chore. I sincerely hope things return to normal tomorrow so I can write about more silly and “interesting” things without feeling like my head is going to split open.

Lets Get Down To Business

Sundays are not that eventful. There aren’t many people working, and things are slow enough that we often find strange ways to goof off. Needless to say, I spent most of the day laughing.

Pharm ( Farm?) Party: Someone decided to tell a  story about their friend who went to a pharm party ( party with tons of random pills a.k.a a great way to die). Needless to say me along with everyone else thought she was talking about a party where one would dress up as their favorite type of livestock. I would totally be a llama. 

Angry Faces: Apparently being six feet tall does not make me intimidating. In an attempt to show that I meant business, I tried to make an intimidating angry face ( complete with trying to show my “intimidating”  arm muscles). This act was met with the comments: ” the only thing you look like is a skeleton” and ” well maybe you could beat up a squirrel or an ant”.  Soooo I guess I’m not scary?

I’ll Make A Man Out Of You: We decided singing the song from Mulan would inspire us to conquer our deli work. Deli Workers: The musical <- Coming soon to a theater near you.

Affinity For White Sauces And Meat:  Too many dirty jokes.

White Kidz and Rap Songz: In addition to Disney classics, speaking dirty rap lyrics ( instead of singing or rapping them) seemed to make time fly by. I mean seriously, throw the lyrics ” drop,drop it on the bitch, make it nasty” in to pretty much any random convo and you’re in for some giggles ( well….at least we were).  

Poems: “There once was a Chef named Randy, whose attitude just wasn’t so dandy. He slipped on an olive pit, and lost his shit, and burned the market to the ground”It’s the little things, right?

Boring Day

Slightly exhausted. Today was full of crazy catering orders and nonstop running. On the plus side, I learned a new skill: how to bread chicken. I do not really know how useful of a skill it will be, but eh who knows? Other than that nothing super crazy happened. Spilled beet juice all over myself, helped clean up some catering stuff; the usual.

Aside from work, I hear back from some potential jobs next week. Needless to say, I’m already stressing and extremely anxious. Thank goodness for butterscotch chips and funny t.v. shows….   

….And then there are the days when you just have to laugh

In between all the stress of job hunting and worrying about my future, I have still managed to find something to smile about every day. Today it wasn’t a post on Reddit or a joke, but, once again my klutziness:

Our deli has 3 scales where we weigh and price product. Other departments also use these scales to do the same things. While I have nothing against the other departments who come into our work space, I do have an issue with the fact that none of them know how to fix these damn things when they break. Today, a newer employee from produce was pricing some chocolate covered pretzels as I was helping customers and running around like a headless chicken. I was about to leave to put away some stock, when out of the corner of my eye I saw this kid standing by the scale with a panicked look on his face. I figured that I should probably see if he needed help. I was half way across the deli when suddenly my foot collided with some milk crates that were partially stacked under a nearby counter. Now I don’t know why on earth we have these things scattered about, but its like walking through a minefield: you never know when or where one is going to be and how badly its going to injure you. Needless to say all six feet of me toppled into the dessert container holder. The cracking sounds of plastic cake domes and cupcake holders echoed throughout the store. Next thing I know I am on the floor. I felt my face turning bright red as I saw my co workers and the random produce kid begin to laugh. I couldn’t help but join in. Tears streamed from my eyes as I lifted myself off the deli floor. Of course trying to help the poor kid in produce proved to be almost pointless considering I was in tears and continued to laugh with my other co workers for another 10+ minutes.

But it didn’t end there. At the end of my shift I took some dishes into the kitchen to find the kitchen staff staring at me: ” Maddie, we heard you went on a trip. Like you took a trip recently? A really nice one”. I stood there for about 15 seconds dumbfounded: ” A trip? What the hell are they…. OHHHH” . The Crying and laughing began again….Even as I sit here hours later writing this; i’m crying and laughing. I love days like this.

3 hour shifts exist?!

Another interview down, hopefully one less rejection pending…. Forgive me but I find it very hard to be optimistic and  get my hopes up about anything these days.

 

I ran to work right after. Three hour shifts literally feel like 15 minutes when you are used to working 8-9 hour days…Not like I’m complaining; it was practically a day off with some pay involved. The tension is still mounting daily. You can tell people are unhappy. At this point it is only a matter of time till the bubble bursts. I keep preparing myself, however, part of me keeps hoping I’m not around to witness it. On a lighter note, I found a way to keep my co workers entertained with my extreme klutziness. I managed to spill everything all over myself today ( guacamole, mustard, beet juice, Garbanzo beans, Ranch dressing, Thousand Island dressing, etc). In addition to that I managed to knock over some supplies and practically destroyed half my pelvis on a metal counter. It is days like these where I feel like they should pay me not to come in …I mean lets be real; I probably damaged more money worth of product than I made today anyway. Other than that there was nothing too crazy or exciting that occurred…I guess I’ll wait and see if tomorrow brings new insanities and weirdness. 

interview

“The thing always happens that you really believe in; and the belief in a thing makes it happen”

If I were a meme….

I am pretty sure I would be: Condescending Maddie. Now I do not intend to come off as pretentious or bitchy when I vent about my current job situation, but let’s be real. I’m sure most college grads would agree that they did not spend thousands of dollars and hours upon hours studying, doing projects, homework etc to be earning less than ten dollars an hour. Billy likes to call me out on this all the time. Today he overheard one of my general rants revolving around “needing a real person job”. He wasted no time jumping all over me: ” Oh so what Maddie…We are not real people?!”. As per usual I apologized semi sarcastically for being a sassy bitch, and he replied  that ” he’s just messing with me”. Part of me really wonders how much he’s messing with me at this point, but it is not really high on my priority list to debunk currently ( especially since we go through this song and dance pretty much every day…But I digress). But more importantly, he cannot seem to comprehend why I panic about job interviews and my future 24/7 as opposed to getting down with Mary and some alternative tunes on a daily basis. Now I am not saying I don’t need a regular chill pill, but the fact of the matter is I have a ton of debt, diverse work experiences and a strong work ethic, yet, currently lack a work environment that lets me work on all these things at the same time. This all probably comes back to the fact that I was raised in a community and a household that valued education. College was never a question; the only unknown was whether or not I would choose Ivy league or Big Ten. I forget sometimes that not everyone was raised like this. While I am grateful that this upbringing instilled in me the work ethic, diligence and precision I have today, I sometimes wonder how my current outlook and stress levels would differ if I had been raised differently…..

“Midway through our life’s journey I went astray from the straight road and awoke to find myself alone in a dark wood.”

Aside from job searching in my spare time, I have found that not being in school has given me a lot of time to catch up on television. While I have my guilty vices such as Grey’s Anatomy, I have also been obsessed with random Netflix documentaries and actually learned some pretty nifty info on topics ranging from human attraction to World War II. Last night I got all comfy in my sweatpants, and with my bowl of animal crackers in hand indulged in the Mad Men. As I was watching the season 6 opener last night, I was not only fixated on the hunk of man Don Draper is, but also the repeated themes of death, aging and change. We all know death, much like aging and change, is inevitable. But what about death beyond the physical sense? In Mad Men, both Roger’s mother and his shoe man’s deaths were physical; they were no longer physically living. These deaths serve as interesting comparisons to individuals like Don Draper, who are very much alive physically, but appear dead emotionally and spiritually. Surprisingly, this theme of spiritual and emotional death played a major role in my activities today.

My boss is a nice man named Jerry. He is an easy going and approachable guy who reminds me of the lovable  yet weird uncle who tells bad jokes, and never hesitates to throw in some awkward comment in a conversation that makes you turn the color of a ripe tomato. Since I was off all weekend, we took the first half of my shift to catch up on the notes from Friday’s management meeting. I always love hearing about these meetings because they literally consist of everyone ripping apart our department for a good hour. I was naive enough at the beginning to ask if there were any positives… let’s just say until I see winged pigs flying around the store, I won’t be asking that question again for a very long time. But today was especially distressing. He looked distraught today….Like the quirky had been sucked right out of him. He ran through the notes with me; no positives SURPRISE!!!! ( not). But after he drudged through the long list of grievances, he looked me straight in the eyes and said: “45… That is all I have… 45 days to make everything better or else they will find someone else who can”. I didn’t know what to do or say. He looked so pale and broken down that I felt no words of encouragement that I could muster would help. He continued: ” We are talking about my livelihood here…”. Here Jerry is; a living, breathing, human being who might as well be a corpse. The lively color that lit up his face when we met eight months ago has slowly faded to a dim glow. The spring in his step has been replaced with a brisk, firm trot as if he is trying to escape the depths of hell and Dante’s pitiless punishments. And here I am; a powerless pawn in what is beginning to feel like the inferno. All I can do is hope that with each passing day I am closer to change, and that I can preserve my spirit, and  my livelihood. If there is one thing this job has taught me: I will walk through life not solely existing, but thriving physically and spiritually.

Lazy Sunday

Didn’t really wake up in the late afternoon, but when you get up at 6:30 every morning, 9am sure feels like you did. My days off are extremely uneventful. I apply for a few jobs, get a work out in, run a few errands and then often find myself glued to my computer watching Netflix, or old episodes of Whose Line Is It Anyway on Youtube. While I sit here slowly killing what are left of my brain cells, It seems like my friends are always doing school work. They are panicking about midterms, meeting with groups, working on projects, or frantically writing that paper they forgot is due tomorrow morning.  I can say in all seriousness that I miss it… Sure the stress of an exam sucked, and being in the library 4 hours each day was not what most people define as “fun”, but I still feel a bit envious of my peers. Sure I could be studying for my GRE right now, but between  38 hours a week of work ( yes 38, god forbid they pay me over time…It may anger the grocery gods and potentially bankrupt the store), the job applications and the interviews I am honestly burnt out. However, if these next interviews do not come back as full time offers, I think I am going to move studying to the tippy top of my priority list.

Tomorrow starts the work week again. 6 days of sandwiches, stocking and sarcasm. I just keep hoping that I will get some good news sometime soon.