CLUNK!! or, The sound of the other shoe dropping...

Maybe it was just a summer romance. Girl meets job, girl falls in love with job, job is not necessarily truthful with Girl, Girl must either leave job or make big compromise. Any way you look at it, Girl is very disappointed. And sad.
The promises- much like, "I will leave my wife to be with you, because we belong together". They told me how right I seemed for the job. They were going to fire someone and I would combine my job with his. I was going to get a $20,000. raise when this happened. And I was ready to work. I was going to give 'em all I got. I was going to clean up that nasty and disgusting kitchen. I would throw away all those science experiments he has growing in the refrigerators. I would re-organize, re-do, re-vamp and re-energize the whole place. I was in love and I had the manic energy of someone half my age and twice my size.
The handsome Italian chef kept shaking his head though. She's not going to get rid of him, he kept saying. She's too insecure, she thinks she needs him.
Last week she told me face to face that he would be let go this week.
Well, it's Friday. And he's more there than ever.
He- being the big fat pastry chef with the bad attitude. Once again, me and the pastry chefs. He's quite enormous and can be quite underhanded and nasty. He had repeatedly set me up to fail and to look bad. I'm no dummy. I know when I'm getting screwed. Kindly buy me dinner first, Fatso.
Chef wanted him out of there. From the moment I got there that's what he confided in me. That they would make these changes. That I better get ready for when it happens. And I tried to gear up. When Fatboy wasn't there I'd try to do the two jobs. It wasn't easy. I had to work out of his creepy, disorganized area. I did not have a baking assistant (something else promised to me when all these "changes" happened). But I would pull it off, pull it off well. I put in the hours, I always kept a smile on my face and worked. I wanted to prove myself.
But time kept rolling by. And Big-boy was still there. He's not only there, he's there all the time. It's part of his diabolical genius.
Chef had said, this guy has no life. He comes in at 1 o'clock in the morning and stays forever. Meanwhile if he's here so much why isn't his work done on time? And he's got a whole Mexican army doing most of his work.
Even after his work is essentially done, he is still there. I don't believe in staying around after my work is done. Plus, I do have a life. Since I started this job I have had dinner with my son just about every night and it's made life a whole lot more bearable here at my home. I may leave at 5 am, but I'm behind the stove in my kitchen at 5:30 pm. The only pull I have on my teenage son these days is money and food. So dinner is a good way to get to know him a bit.
The Doughboy has a wife, supposedly. Sometimes she drives him all the way into the city to work. I resent this a lot as I'm fighting my eyelids to stay open while driving myself into work everyday. The wife takes care of his son too. I have always said I wish I had a wife.
Enough about him. It's the big picture I am sad about. Being the loyal Horton the Elephant type that I am, I mean what I say and I say what I mean. Which means that basically I believed that this would happen. And now I see that it's not.
So, the Fat Bastard won. Big "changes", etc. are not going to happen. I started browsing on the internet again to look for a new job.
One way to look at this however- I did not leave a job to come here. I was out of work and thought that I had to work for the Man. This job came along and touched a cord in me that was long lost. The city, Greenwich Village, a whole other life that could be out there for me. "Better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all", isn't that the famous quote? I reached out and loved. This job changed me, I think forever now. Even if I must move on. I am a different person than the one who closed the cafe back in June.
Like the disillusioned lover, I am sad. I have some resentments and I'm angry that I have to start all over again. I had hoped that I had found a home.
I will go to work and I will do my job. Every day. And I will do it well. And somewhere out there, I'll find maybe not a great love right away, but a job that is kind, decent and pays me what I'm worth.

Next Stop, Greenwich Village

Yup, I'm back in the kitchen. But don't have much bitch'n. At least not right now.
My life is almost normal now. I have dinner with my son at home just about every night. I look and feel like a different person.
My first paycheck, I thought, wow- this is great! Then after I'd paid bills that week I got nervous. Uh, oh- gonna be a little tight on money. Then I remembered, hey! I get another one this Friday! You see, I went without pay pretty much the whole time during the business. I could count the times I got paid on one hand and still have enough fingers left to snap.
All the problems, all the non-stop bullshit that goes on every single day in this business- I empathize, but I can go home. I talk with the owner and the executive chef and I really try to help them and I know from all the way inside of me how hard it is for them but it's not my head anymore.
The kitchen needs a complete overhaul. The equipment needs a complete overhaul. Honestly, I don't know how they passed their health inspection. I do wish that I could show them where I came from, and even before that, and come to think of it-before that one too! How clean, how state of the art.
But I always say, I cut my teeth in a place like this. Where you just make it work. How many employees did I have that whined constantly about equipment and tools. I wanted to shake them by their neck and say, "do you know how good you have it?!". I do harbor a little resentment for some of the people who were with me. How they took so much for granted, especially my kindness. People can be so lazy, and yes I see it at the new job as well, but at my place they had me by the short hairs. It was like gym class, you get an A just for showing up and bringing your sneakers.
I have a new found sense of freedom. My hands are back in the food again. I cook every single day and bake too. Though I have bosses, and sometimes they are hard to please I feel that I can learn a lot. In some ways this is different from anything I've ever done. I have a couple of menus coming up that were given to me that are really a departure for me but I am excited about executing them.
Now I am also coming out as my true self. I told my one stupid Spanish joke I know to the guys and they laughed. The kitchen is so damn small that we are like roaches on top of one another in there. We can't help rubbing against each other as we move around. I told this one kid who's a dishwasher that if he does that one more time he's going to have to marry me.
Now too, I am reflecting and analyzing my whole life. My son will be leaving for school next autumn and I will be an empty nester. I have wanted to sell my house for some time, and that is really the way for me to finish off the debt from the cafe. And so I ask myself, do I still belong in Stamford? Maybe this is the beginning of a whole new life.
I have fallen in love with Greenwich Village. As a kid I lived on the Upper West Side and as a young adult I lived on the Upper East Side. I love how people seem to know each other. I love the architecture and the fact that you can see the sky. I think about my dogs, becoming city dogs. Getting rid of my car. Becoming completely unencumbered. Of being near my daughter. The culture, the life.
Even if this job does not work out, because it might not. One never knows. It opened my eyes. I'm done with the past. I have friends and family that I love in Stamford but there is no where for me to go career-wise. I'm in the big pond now. I'm with the big fish. I love where I am and where I'm going. It just may be time to kiss the suburbs goodbye with the next stop, Greenwich Village.