Fired. Canned. Shaved. Pink-slipped. Whacked. The boot. And so it goes...
After a week of working my ass off like I-don't-know-what. Working everyday without a break, through the weekend. Getting in earlier, and earlier trying so hard to please. I had a breakthrough somewhere in there with the aforementioned "fat bastard" who in the spirit of change I will just call "the Baker". Somehow we started working together rather than against one another. Suddenly the catering numbers got very high and we had to knock out enormous amounts of food under insane conditions. Let me illustrate:
1. Kitchen from hell. Tiny, filthy, equipment that barely functions and on its last legs. A facility so old that was never meant to be used in this way so it's in complete disarray, including every day the amount of time I must waste just to find tools and ingredients.
1. Holiday weekend. Couldn't get deliveries from their purveyors and had problems with quantities, availabilities. Then when things were to be delivered they were incredibly late and screwed up the whole morning.
3. A boss with a vision that only she seems to get. The menus that she makes are so crazy and hard to produce in this environment. The production sheet she drew up for us was so difficult to read that people stressed just looking at the thing.
4. Booking desk. The girl who had that job just left and is temporarily replaced by a lovely Italian girl who is totally unsuited for the job. The mistakes were flying like birds around the piazza.
I tried. I put in my hours. I worked with the Baker, I sat and tried to make these menus with this lady but by the time they were done we'd lost precious time to start prepping and getting product in house.
So Tuesday was a huge one, 187 people. Ten different orders, special requests, special this and that. It looked like we were in pretty good shape though early in the day. Handsome Italian Chef comes in, the ladyboss had requested him to and things were pretty under control.
The day before I had mentioned sitting down with him and the Baker. I thought it was important to get some things out in the open with us all sitting in a room together. By now I had realized that these people:
1.were not going to fire the Baker
2. Not going to give me the $20,000. raise that I was to get once he was gone.
3. Never going to stop analyzing everything I did and comparing us.
I don't thrive in that kind of environment.
So I sat them down and said to the Baker first, "Baker, I don't want your job. I am not trying to get your job. I respect your talent and what you do here. We both know that there's been a lot said about who's coming, who's going but it's not coming from me. I want to get along with you, in fact I think we are starting to get along much better. You were very disrespectful toward me a couple of weeks ago and I got pissed, but this is a high pressure business and I'm over it. I just believe that we need to treat each other with respect. All of us. That's all I ask for is respect and communication. To Italian chef I say "And when you hear the bosslady tell you that I said you are throwing away tomatoes you must understand that I do not talk like that. She draws her own conclusions. If I have a problem with you I say it to your face and not behind your back to her."
"I like this job, I need this job. But I am sick and tired of being under a microscope and feeling like I'm in some kind of a competition. We all know that we work for a woman who changes her mind a lot and gets very insecure about making changes. Well, you know what? I'm done with that. I come to work, am pleasant to everyone, put my head down and do my job. The worst that can happen is she fires me, and is she does, she does but I'm not going to be stressed everyday about it and be insecure. I'm good at what I do and if it's not right for her, then that's the way it is.
The Baker then vented all that had been troubling him and why he'd had such a problem with me from the beginning. It all made perfect sense. Again with no communication it makes people very insecure about their jobs and who is doing what. I said that later we'll talk and divvy up who does what and how to make it work.
One last thing I said, and perhaps it was a catalyst in what transpired a few hours later. I said, "When I had my business, if I had to fire someone, I fired them. I didn't bullshit around making people nervous, letting rumors fly, I just did it. And Italian Chef concurred and said, "yes, it's very unhealthy"
We were interrupted by the bosslady who looked a tad paranoid to see the three of us sitting down together at the table. She made a comment about whether that was a good idea when we had 187 lunches to get out. So we broke it up.
But there was a real feeling of lightening up. It was palpable, that the tension between the three of us had been replaced by dare I say it, a little bond? Shortly after Italian chef left the job in our hands and went home to get some sleep.
That's when the shit hit the fan.
All the mistakes started up. We got way behind in the kitchen. There were so many different menus and requests that with our Italian ditz booker and our temperamental expeditor it was only getting worse. The food was plating and some did not look so great, or the amounts seemed off. The Mexican lead cook who works with me was sweating bullets trying so hard to get everything out. Once the food left the phones started ringing with the complaints, "where is our order?", "we specifically asked for vanilla cupcakes!", "the pasta is not right", etc., etc, etc... Though it wasn't all me, I knew I'd be in the doghouse. Somehow lately I'd felt the eyes had been watching me, which was part of why I'd made my spiel before. And worst of all, the Mexican cook walked out. Said it was too much for him to handle anymore. Down deep I knew I had a part in that.
I went out a got a coffee. I hate the coffee at the restaurant. It sucks. I walked around the block past my Murray's Cheese, down the block from Ottomanelli's, the butchers that are my new boyfriends. The village, the village, my new love. But a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach was eclipsing what I saw now.
Handsome Italian chef shows up, all freshly shaved and groomed. We sit. We talk a bit about what happened. He gets most emotional about the Mexican cook. How we cannot lose him. How hard a worker he is, how great a chef he is, how he got him through all that catering he had to do. I am sorry but if I had to choose between the two of you I would have to go with him!
Look, he says, you are a really great person and a really great chef. I have learned a lot from you. But he cannot take on that load. It's too much for him. I think you are overqualified for this job, you should be an executive chef. You are very good at directing people but once you get past 60-80 people you just cannot keep up.
And, he was right.
When I took this job I knew this would have to be my last truly physical job. I am not a 28 year old Mexican man. I'm a fifty year old woman. I'm really good but that part of my capabilities is changing.
I feel terrible, he said. "look, it's more work for me now, I don't want to do this catering stuff. But I had to make an executive decision and it's going to be you."
I never let them see me cry. It's my number one girl in the kitchen rule. EVER. Somehow you must muffle your voice and don't let your face drop. I went to the back and shook the Baker's hand, "just when we were starting to get along", I said. His scraggly bearded jaw dropped. He was truly surprised. "We'll talk", I said.
Walking to my parking garage. Where they know me now too. My new little village. Now back to Stamford where I don't feel like I belong anymore.
I didn't leave a job to come here, I really did not take a risk. Just the risk you always take when you trust.
This job was a like a rebound relationship. Right after closing to meet this fabulous guy who I read all the qualities I wanted into. He just happens to be married but says he's leaving his wife in two weeks. Life is great. But after a while he's not leaving the wife. And I'm not getting the things that were promised to me. And it gets hurtful and stressful. Till finally the guy says, I've decided to stay with my wife. And the last straw is he packs your bag, says you're really great but goodbye.
You walk out the door with your junk hanging out of the suitcase and wander down the street, fighting back the tears till you get in your car and say, "what the fuck just happened?"
