I see the blank canvas

     before the paint

I feel the depth of blue

     as you mix greys together

I know the thin red line beneath the white brush stroke

     painted on like a bandage

I warm

     as your brush dips into bright yellow

As you clean your brushes

     your mask complete

          I can see beneath it

               as if it wasn’t there

 

So as I wrapped up my second week at my own shop I actually took a few minutes to live in the moments that had made up my stint there. I learned to accept the compliments that people gave me when they told me how pleased they were to have me back. It was fantastic to reconnect with folks that I had begun to develop a relationship with and it was awesome to be able to do it all without the watchful eye of “mother” waiting to slap me back to conformity. Aside from one singularly crabby person who only growled once people seemed genuinely pleased to have me back and I was really enjoying their positive feedback.

Well I was for the first week anyway then it started to wear a little thin, then it began to wear out completely. It wasn’t that I didn’t appreciate people’s comments about me, it was the comments that always followed the question “when is SHE back”? Each time someone asked me that question their demeanor was not one of anticipation and almost everyone followed the question with their own personal observation of my boss. None of it was positive and I honestly did try my best to defend her by pointing out that this is a very demanding job for only one person and that it can be stressful at times. All that got me was curious looks as people pointed out that I was the only one there and seemed to be doing just fine and aside from a bad case of hiccups I didn’t look stressed.

I suspect I will receive another phone call on Monday morning from our head office wanting to know what my sales were for the week before. For some strange reason they can’t seem to be able to wait for the paper work I mailed out on Friday to arrive which I have begun to find a wee bit irritating. For the past two weeks my sales have been roughly $120 above our average for the same time frame last year and the year before and my tips have gone from $3.50ish a day to over $15 each day. I’m not so slow that I can’t connect the dots between my return and increased sales. Sadly and shamefully I honed my customer service skills on tourists at one of PEI’s premiere hotels. I say shamefully because it takes the skill of manipulation to get people to part with their money.

If you present the right image to someone like, they’re the most important person on planet Earth you will probably receive a nice tip in return, hmmm that leans really hard against the line of lying/manipulation. If you refuse to interact with customers you will get a tip matching your interaction, like none. Be rude to customers and watch your sales tank. I have explained this little nugget of economical truth to my boss and she had begun to make changes towards customers before they let me go in the Spring.

These past two weeks have been amazing for me in terms of having my ego stroked but I find the comments/names regarding my boss to be somewhat cruel. My rule is “don’t say anything about someone that you won’t say to them”. Perhaps people are just trying to provide me with a scale at which they have measured my customer service skills or maybe they honestly are happy to have me back but I don’t appreciate the negative comments about my boss. They may very well be true but again I go back to my rule. These past two weeks have been a bitter blessing as I am appreciated for who I am but at the expense of who my boss is not.

Maybe next week sales will return to normal, my tips will shrivel away to nothingness and life at the cafeteria will return to normal as my stay is extended for another week. Or maybe just maybe, they will hire me back, or fire me for good. Stay tuned and I’ll let you know.

Have you ever gotten out of bed in the morning and thought it was a different day. Millions of Canadians all across this great nation had that weird feeling today. It felt like a Monday, which is weird because if it was Monday what happened to our 2 day weekend? Because July 1st fell on a Tuesday this year we had a mini holiday the day after Monday which completely upset the regular pattern of us poor working folk who couldn’t take Monday off. For about an hour I dragged my sleep deprived butt around our little shop muttering to myself that I really didn’t care much for yet another Monday morning. Then the dim little light went off………..heyyyyyy it’s Wednesday, in 2 days it will be Friday and I began my frantic search for my can of Red Wave.

I’m not sure what the exact ingredient is that makes you smile but there is definitely something happy inducing in those cans. I’m pretty sure it’s not the caffeine alone or the obscene amount of sugar because I have consumed large quantities of both and still not come close to that oh so happy feeling. My fear is that it will become like a drug to me much like my years of buzzed living where everything was Okey dokey just fine and dandy, man. Maybe it hit me hard today because I thought it was Monday or because I am ridiculously lacking sleep but today I soared. Customers thought I had totally gone mad because my usual chipper demeanour was bordering on well, beyond anything I have exposed them to up ’til now.

Oh don’t wince, I wasn’t totally wild, real close but not totally, I managed to keep on all the clothes I left the house with and try as I might I could not jump up and touch the ceiling. The best part of today was reminding people that it was Wednesday, not Monday, funny how that seemed to perk up a lot of dreary looking people. The sad part of today was how many people truly believed it was Monday and their inability to remember that they only had a 1 day weekend. Some folks just work too hard.

I was looking toward the end of the week thinking it will be a shame for Friday to come as my stint back at my own digs comes to an end. Like a scene out of Get Smart the phone (I don’t take it out of the cabinet where it gets locked up) rang and my stint has been extended. Hmmm, now exactly how many more cans of Red Wave will I need?