A small fact about me: I’ve been working at State College ’s Chick-fil-A for the past two and a half
years. That’s starting to feel like a long time. Somehow, I still really like
chicken. I also still really like my job. But staying in one place with the
same people for that amount of time definitely changes a person. My acquired
superpower is being able to fill a cup of sweet tea, make a milkshake, take a
customer’s order on headset, listen to a coworker tell me about the really
funny thing that happened to them last night, and respond coherently to both customer
and coworker, all in under one minute and all at the same time. (That’s real,
guys. This is my biggest career accomplishment thus far.) Besides multi-tasking skills, I've also observed
a lot about people and relationships and life craziness, all at this
establishment that now feels like another home. And it’s really funny how the
same job makes me think over and over (usually on the same day, sometimes
within the same fifteen minutes), “Wow, human beings are such incredibly
wonderful things” and “Wow, human beings are horrible chicken-eating maniacs
and I never want to speak to another one again.”
If you know anything about Chick-fil-A, you probably know
that being super friendly and accommodating is part of the job description.
(I've said the words “My pleasure” more times than I could ever count.) Holding
open doors, answering questions, mopping up spills, apologizing for things that
aren't your fault (except when they sometimes are your fault), cleaning up
little-kid barf in the playroom, smiling, making small talk, remembering the
names of the regulars, refilling drinks… this is our life at the front of the
house. On good days, it’s the absolute best. Those are the days when you see
all your favorite customers and you laugh every other sentence and the whole world
seems beautiful. On bad days, it’s the absolute worst. (Those times, you grit
your teeth, try to make a lot of jokes, and then pretend that you have to stock
things so that you can go cry in the cooler.)
Sometimes, after a long and (occasionally) bad work day, I
curl up with my backpack and headphones on the bus and think about all the
things I feel like I’m missing thanks to my ordinary job and my ordinary life
as a college student, and I soak in this combination of misery and self-pity and
angsty folk music all the way home. It’s a good thing this doesn't happen on a
daily basis, because it’s quite a terrible state to exist in. But it did happen
on Monday. Monday was full of lots of sighing and staring out the drive-thru
window and wishing that I didn't have to think about classes when I got home
and wondering how I ended up in food service when I could have been… I don’t
know, working in a orphanage in Kenya
or something? Because sometimes, after the hundredth rude customer of the day
has come and gone (along with most of my patience and more of my self esteem
than I care to admit), it’s easy to ask myself, “Is there some greater meaning
to this beyond handing hordes of grumpy people bags of chicken sandwiches?”
Thankfully, I realized both yesterday and today that
the answer is still yes. Somehow, despite wishing for far-off adventure and
keeping a running bucket-list in my head, I keep getting surprised by how much
life defies the word ordinary and by how the word adventure is so much bigger
than my poor attempts to define it. Like walking to the bus stop in the early
morning while most of the town is still asleep and realizing that snow and
chimney smoke and slow-blinking red lights are kind of magical, like everyone
waiting for the bus and yawning and breathing into their hands to keep warm is
part of a secret club and only we know what this place is really like before
everything wakes up. Getting coffee at the Panera downtown every morning in
between buses, and then sitting at the booth behind the coffee dispensers and
pretending to journal… but I’m actually listening in to all the hilarious
things the employees say to each other when they think customers aren't
listening. At work, washing dishes and throwing handfuls of bubbles at each
other and belting off-key to whatever’s on the radio, or doubling over with
laughter in the drive-thru at the most outrageous thing a customer just said, or dancing through the dining room on slow days when
the place is empty. (We did that yesterday. Dancing, that is.
Yesterday was the slowest day imaginable, but it was snowing and somehow being
able to commiserate about our imprisonment made it much better.)
Today at work a three-year-old and I became instant friends when I smiled at him through the window, he slowly smiled back, and
then proudly held up all of his Spiderman action figures so that I could see
them. Communication consisted of earnest babyspeak (him) and lots of smiling and
waving and goofy faces (me), all while his mom was obliviously
digging in her purse for change. And this is exactly the kind of thing that makes me think I wouldn't mind enduring every cranky customer in State College as long as I get to meet tiny humans like him.
Today I felt so lucky that I work with friends, real
friends, not just people that I say hi to at work three days a week. I’m glad
that we all like to laugh so much, because otherwise we’d be even more of a
dysfunctional family than we already are. Thankful too for the customers who
remember our names and stop to ask us how we’re doing (and wait for answers).
I’m not sure that all the kind people who come to Chick-fil-A realize how much
their words matter to us, even if it’s a twenty-second interaction. I want to
tell all of them, “You’re the reason why I just decided all over again that I
love my job!” Sometimes I do. I think I should say it more often. Being in a
place that requires constant interaction is exhilarating and challenging and
dizzying and frustrating and exhausting and sometimes absolutely hilarious and
sometimes just plain old discouraging… but getting to share life with so many people,
even if it’s only for a minute, is still worth it.
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