Because my life is an open book on Wrights Lane, I will share one last sad and pathetic "downer" story in keeping with my last post on the subject of "...Struggling to Keep Our Lives Real."
A few months after my wife Rosanne passed away early last summer, I realized the necessity of finding a simple, part-time job to help supplement my seriously eroded fixed income. I had noticed an almost perpetual sign on the door of our local grocery mart: "Produce Dept. Help Wanted".
Why not, I thought..."I could do that!"
The manger of the produce department just happened to be a former neighbour and in my mind a good friend. After more than a week of contemplation, I worked up sufficient nerve to approach the middle-aged female manager one day when I was shopping in the store. "Have you hired anyone yet for that job?" I asked.
"Yes," she said, "but I still need a salad maker."
I immediately reminded myself that, as chief cook and bottle washer at home, I had been making salads for years. How difficult could the job of salad maker be?
"Well, how about me?" I asked.
"Are you serious? she questioned. "Do you really want to work in produce?"
"Yes, I'm deadly serious," I hastily responded.
Emphasizing that the job required long periods of standing on one's feet and was highly productivity oriented, she invited me to come back the following week for a period of orientation which consisted of a four-hour shift with another experienced salad maker. Somewhat overwhelmed with the variety of salads and their ingredients, I felt nonetheless sufficiently motivated to take on the job.
It was agreed that I would work two or three shifts a week to start, mostly on weekends. I was proud of myself for having obtained a job after a good 20 years in complete retirement. My first impulse was to let my daughters know that I was "returning to the work force" as a salad maker, of all things. They were surprised, both expressing approval with detectable reservation.
With encouragement and congratulations from fellow staff members that I had become acquainted with during frequent weekly shopping visits, I put on a hair net, store-supplied baseball cap and apron, ready for my first shift as salad maker assistant. Overall, in retrospect, I retained as much of the hastily passed on information as possible and thought that training went went as well as could be expected. I also felt comfortable with my cutting and shredding ability and was confident that in time I would memorize all the recipes without having to refer to the contents manual.
I was on my own for the next shift a few days later and was greeted by the department manager who had a good 18 years of experience working in produce. "I just made up 12 salads in 15 minutes before you came in Dick," she announced. "I've left a list of 20 more different salads for you to make up and after that you will have to make sure that items are replaced as they are sold. I'll be working elsewhere on produce displays, but I'll check in with you from time to time."
With an obvious, abrupt change of attitude and a very serious face, she added. "I hope that at the end of the day you will be prepared if I have to tell you that this is not going to work out!"
Wow, I thought, she is really trying to tell me something and her mind is already made up. Had I not demonstrated sufficient capabilities in my orientation shift?...Had I done something(s) wrong? Or was it because I was a male doing what would have normally been a female job? Was she otherwise influenced and made to feel uncomfortable with me? Then again and worst of all, was it because of my age (80 plus) and she felt I could not keep up with the pace of the job? I'll never know, I guess.
All in all, not the best of circumstances with which to start my first solo shift. I definitely felt the pressure. Methodical by nature, I worried when I had to take the time required to consult an unfamiliar salad recipe, or to find the different locations in coolers for the required contents (varieties of lettuce, cabbage, cucumbers, celery, onions, peppers, tomatoes, broccoli, spinach, mixed greens, cheese, bacon crumbs, chicken, grapes, pineapple, strawberries, melons -- you name it) and appropriate dressings and suitable containers of differing sizes. Several fruit salads that I made up had to be re-made because the melon was deemed too ripe (personally, I like over-ripe melon). The final setback in my day reared its ugly head when the weigh scale labelling machine broke down and I had to leave eight fruit and vegetable bowls in the fridge for next day when the machine was repaired.
I felt the immanent and uncomfortable fall of the axe when at the end of the shift the manager rushed into the backroom work station and ignored me as she began to busily clean up the area. I tried to help, but got the strong impression that I was getting in the way.
Finally she dropped everything and, choosing words awkwardly and carefully, said: "Dick, I have to tell you that this is not working out...I have trained(?) enough people to know. You are not really on the payroll yet so the owners will likely pay you by cash from the til...Sorry!"
Ashen-faced, she reached out to hug me and I pretended that it was alright. I ceremoniously took off my cap, hairnet and apron and left them on the work counter beside the disabled labelling machine. She left to occupy herself elsewhere.
Considering it pointless to clock out, I left the store sheepishly avoiding eye contact with any of the other employees and completely disillusioned by the fact that this misplaced old guy had not been given a fair chance to prove himself. I am still convinced that I could have consistently done a good job and would have been a reliable worker, traits not all that common from what I know about the business.
I never did collect my pay.
Worst of all, I had to eventually advise my daughters that their dad's time in the work force was short lived. Being typical daughters, they thought that it was all for the better.
I now do my grocery shopping elsewhere. I am simply too embarrassed to return to the scene of the crime.
Talk about real life mimicking my worst nightmare...It could only happen to me!
If I am smart, I will never again make myself so vulnerable...even if I have to end up starving to death in my old age. I even stopped making salads at home for a while...I just did not have the taste for it.
My ego has slowly returned to its normally tentative level and I am making salads again -- for my own consumption, of course. They taste pretty damn good too! Even if I do say so myself.
P.S. The grocery store continues to advertise for help in the produce department and I wonder how many other potential salad makers they have gone through since me?...A whole lot I hope.
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