For What It's Worth (LJ Idol Week 4)
I worked in a restaurant for 13 years.
For those around the Midwest, it was a Frisch's Big Boy. For those not, it was a hybrid sit down restaurant with a drive-thru option. I worked the drive thru for the most part, until about six or seven years in, (and I don't remember why exactly, the years and managers and days there blend together slightly,) I decided to start waitressing.
I was not born to be a waitress.
For one, I'm terrible at small talk, and I don't have the sort of personality that endears me exactly to strangers. But I'm good at remembering orders and drinks and checking up on people and I made decent tips.
I remember that summer very clearly: during the week I'd work drive thru, and on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, I'd waitress. I put my change in an old cookie jar shaped like a dinosaur, and my bills with the change too.
In late August of that year, I remember pulling my change jar out and counting out my ones, piling them in groups of tens across my floor, smiling as the numbers and piles grew larger.
I think that was the first time I ever really could see what my work was worth.
I don't remember how much it added up to, except that it was probably the most physical money I'd had in my hands ever.
I still think about that day, the bills in my hand, the piles of ones, and for one moment, the money meant a little something more than it had when I just got a regular paycheck.
The feeling, much like the job, has gone away, but sometimes, when I have a dollar bill or two, I smile, and remember the piles of money, and what it was worth to me.
For those around the Midwest, it was a Frisch's Big Boy. For those not, it was a hybrid sit down restaurant with a drive-thru option. I worked the drive thru for the most part, until about six or seven years in, (and I don't remember why exactly, the years and managers and days there blend together slightly,) I decided to start waitressing.
I was not born to be a waitress.
For one, I'm terrible at small talk, and I don't have the sort of personality that endears me exactly to strangers. But I'm good at remembering orders and drinks and checking up on people and I made decent tips.
I remember that summer very clearly: during the week I'd work drive thru, and on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, I'd waitress. I put my change in an old cookie jar shaped like a dinosaur, and my bills with the change too.
In late August of that year, I remember pulling my change jar out and counting out my ones, piling them in groups of tens across my floor, smiling as the numbers and piles grew larger.
I think that was the first time I ever really could see what my work was worth.
I don't remember how much it added up to, except that it was probably the most physical money I'd had in my hands ever.
I still think about that day, the bills in my hand, the piles of ones, and for one moment, the money meant a little something more than it had when I just got a regular paycheck.
The feeling, much like the job, has gone away, but sometimes, when I have a dollar bill or two, I smile, and remember the piles of money, and what it was worth to me.