Do YOU Love Your Job?

Time again for Mama Kat’s Almost World Famous Writer’s Workshop.  This week I chose prompt  #5.) What do you love most about your job? 

Right now I don’t have what you would consider a “job”.  I have chaos and a soon to be way of life hopefully leading to a comfortable retirement.  When I got laid off a couple of years ago my husband decided he liked having me home all the time and that he would just as soon that I never go back to work and actually I had kind of settled into a semi retirement that I was enjoying.  Then in February he comes home one day and tells me he’s quit his job and wants “us” to open a restaurant.  My first reaction? WTH?

I did tell him I was behind him 100% and that whatever he wanted and needed me to do I was there for him.  I wasn’t quite sure how this was going to pan out since every other member of our family (hubby, all 3 of our daughters AND our son in law) have all worked in restaurants.  I was the sole member of the family that has NOT worked in a restaurant other than a fairly short stint in the office of a country club.  Albeit if someone was late or didn’t show up for work I’d pitch in and help with making tea or taking orders or pouring coffee or ringing up a sale if no one else was there…. That has been the extent of my restaurant training.

Now we are embarking on not just working in a restaurant but “owning” a restaurant which entails a whole lot more knowledge than I currently have.  I must admit I am learning an awful lot in an extremely short period of time.  And I’m finding that as exhausted as I am at the end of the day… I am LOVING it!

And when I say we are opening a restaurant please know that I mean from the ground up.  In less than 8 weeks’ time we have gone from an empty shell of a building to opening day!  We are opening next Tuesday and we are SO excited.  If Sunday was any indication I think we will be fine.  But… this has been baptism by fire so to speak.  I have learned to negotiate with vendors of restaurant equipment and pick our dishes and hook up phones and pick out menu covers and obtain licenses from local agencies.  We have practically hit the ground running every morning and gone full speed ahead until time to go to bed almost every night.  But it’s a GOOD kind of tired.

And if Sunday was any indication of how it’s going to be, I am going to LOVE my job/life.  We had our pre opening party and had invited lots of old friends/neighbors/acquaintances and lots of them were not able to show up but it’s probably for the best because we still, in the space of less than 4 hours, fed almost 400 people in a restaurant that seats about 50 people.  That means we had to turn over almost every seat twice an hour for almost 4 hours.

We gave away a LOT of food.  It was a preview party and we wanted folks to get a taste of what we’d have to offer and we had NO complaints.  I think the only complaint would have been from the people who may have had to wait a few minutes to get a table.  It was awesome.  I must have also give out about a thousand hugs!  I think I hugged every single person who came in the door at least twice (when they came in and when they left) and some even in between!  But I love people and I love hugs so it was all good.  Dwight even said I probably had one big blister or callous on the whole front of my body from hugging so many people!  There are worse problems to have.

So to answer the question….. What do I love about my job??? E V E R Y T H I N G ! ! ! ! ! ! !

This was taken during the party by Ken Abhalter, the guy we got our big sign from. This was about halfway through the party.

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