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To the ones who have come from away, welcome to the rock!

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I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

I grew up pretty poor. We didn’t starve. We’re never homeless. But there were times my parents struggled to keep the lights on and food on the table. That being said, my mother always made sure we went to school clean and that our clothes had no holes in them.

We also moved a lot when I was a kid. I think it’s one of the reasons I’ve moved a lot as an adult. We never stayed for long anywhere. My dad would lose his job. The landlord would decide to let his sister rent our house. My favorite reason was the owner decided he didn’t want to rent to people with kids.

I was also a grownup kid. I always wanted to be with the adults and even though they tried to keep the struggles from me, I was acutely aware of our finances even as young as 7 or 8. I rarely asked for expensive things and tried to keep my Christmas wishes realistic.

My father was always coming up with creative ways to improve our situation. Once he bought two keeshond puppies. Pure breads that he was going to breed and sell for hundreds if not thousands of dollars. I’m embarrassed now at how they were treated. I’m pretty sure they died tied to a chain in our backyard. They never had puppies and we never made any money off them.

Another one of his brilliant ideas, was to buy into a housing development in Burnside, Kentucky. Over the course of a couple of years, he and my mom bought three undeveloped lots in a development that was going to be the next big thing in the community. The lots were adjacent to each other. He was going to hang on to them until their value grew, OR he was going to build us a home and we’d move there.

I remember being so excited the first time we drove there. For those of you NOT from Kentucky. Burnside is south of Somerset. Somerset is in the southern part of Kentucky about an hour and a half from Lexington. I can’t speak to traveling there now, but in 1975 it was a two lane road, traveling through multiple small towns.

Every so often we’d all pile in the car and my father would announce that we were going to check out “the lots.” We’d sit in the back of the car, my mom chain smoking in the front, watching the sites go by. After what seemed like hours, my father would announce that we were here.

As an eight-year old, I had no concept of what a quality piece of land should be, but I knew this was NOT a quality piece of land. It was rocky. It was overgrown with weeds. There were hardly any homes built in the development. Although my favorite was the A-frame homes on equally crappy land.

We’d climb out of the car and stand on the edge of the street, while my father walked “the lots.” Three equally rocky lots. He’d tell us where the house would go. What he was going to do. I’d try to stay out of the overgrown weeds, because I didn’t want chiggers. And truth be told there really was NOT much to look at.

After a while, we’d get back in the car and drive home. I don’t remember stops. I don’t remember lunch. I don’t remember anything other than the drive down, the 30 minutes admiring the land, and the drive home.

However, one time, my father took a detour after we left “the lots.”

We went to the location of Old Burnside at Lake Cumberland. Old Burnside was a small town, that was flooded over with the construction of Lake Cumberland. The buildings were left standing, the people moved, the land flooded and the lake created.

He drove us there on this particular day, because we’d had a severe lack of rain all summer. And he’d heard that you could see parts of the buildings. Sure enough, he was right. It had only been 20 years and there were ruins displayed over the water, where the drought had done it’s job.

We stood there looking. After a few minutes we walked back to the car. On our way back I saw a rock on the shore. I thought it was beautiful and asked my parents if I could have it and they said yes. The photo below is of that rock.

I have had that rock for 50 plus years now. It’s displayed in my office. It’s as special to me today as it was back then. I just thought it was cool. And I still do.

I held the rock in my lap on the drive home.

We never went back to Old Burnside, but at least twice a summer until I was in high school and old enough to say I didn’t want to go, we’d pile in what was now the pick up truck and treck down to look at “the lots.”

My father never built that house. And based on the last few times I was there, the lots never appreciated as a housing development never occurred. The last time I was there, it looked like an area where you might make crystal meth, if meth was being made in the early 80’s.

At some point, my mother made my father sell the lots. I have no idea what they bought them for. I have no idea what they sold them for. But I can assure you, my father did not get rich off the deal.

I haven’t been to Burnside in over 45 years. But ’m sure by now the remnants of the buildings are gone. But there are probably lots of cool stones along the shore of Lake Cumberland.

Adam’s prompt tonight was rocks.

Gonna give you barley, carrots and pertaters—

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I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

I have always remembered things from my early childhood. Very early. Memories from when I was two or three. Very clear. Very specific memories. And they are definitely not stories that I was told and then created memories of. These are very detailed memories of a small child growing up in Kentucky.

Some of those memories:

I remember a neighbor wrecking her motorcycle in front of our home and my mother passing out because of it. Neither of them were seriously injured.

I remember making mud puddles in our back yard getting the water for the mess from the hand water pump from the kids next door.

I remember putting my hand through our front storm door, when my aunt was chasing me and trying to tie me up.

And my favorite memory from that age, is going to bed. I lived with my mom, her two sisters and my cousin Ricky. It was a four-room house, with a tiny bathroom. I slept with my mom, in a very small bedroom in the back of the house.

On the particular night in question, my mom and I were going to bed. She entered the room, smoking a cigarette, Viceroy’s if I remember correctly, and got into bed. She told me to get into bed as well. But first. I had to say good night to my stuffed animals. My favorite of my toys, was a talking Bugs Bunny Doll. You pulled the string on his back and he said, “What’s up, doc?”

I got into bed, and hugged him close and said, “Good night, Bugs Bunny.” I can see the lamp beside my mom on. She slept on the right side of the bed. Me on the left. Bugs was pulled close on the left side of me. I remember turning over, and hugging him and going to sleep.

There are so many other memories from this time, but that’s my favorite.

My mother took advantage of my love for Bugs Bunny to get me to eat vegetables. I was a very picky eater as a child. And for all of my parents faults, they never forced us to eat food we didn’t like. It was never eat it, or go hungry.

For example, when my mother made liver and onions for my father and her, we’d get a pork chop, or a piece of chicken. While I can eat liver now, it will never be a fan favorite.

However, Bugs Bunny LOVED carrots. LOVED them. So therefore, I LOVED carrots. To this day, it’s probably my favorite vegetable. I love them in any form. Raw. Roasted. Boiled. Out of a can. Out of the garden. In other dishes. Love them. Adam will often roast them in the oven, with just a bit of char. YUM!!!

I googled Bugs Bunny and carrots before starting this post. His love of carrots came from a tribute to It Happened One Night. Clark Gable chewed on carrots and this was a little appreciation from the makers of the cartoons. According to the Google, Bugs Bunny did for carrots what Popeye did for spinach. I do know that it worked on me, because I’d eat them every night as a kid. PS. I was not a fan of popeye, so I didn’t develop a love of spinach until 30 years later.

As I googled information about Bugs Bunny and carrots I learned that carrots should not be a staple for bunnies as they have a high sugar content. A great snack but should not be a staple.

It made me laugh, as I remember working at Day’s Inn restaurant in high school, out off Insterate 75. I started as a dishwasher, but was eventually promoted to cook. A one cook, short order kitchen, with hand written tickets. Fried chicken. Prime rib. Baked scrod. Western omelets. Turkey clubs. I was quick and good at it. Making $3.35 an hour back in 1904.

All of our food arrived frozen and in cans. Thus making it fucking delicious gourmet food in 1904. The carrots came in #10 cans. Giant. I’d use the industrial can opener to get them open. I dump them in a large pot. And then I’d add at least a cup of sugar, because god knows carrots aren’t sweet enough on their own. PS. #10 cans are great for putting table legs on if you need to lift the table to a counter height, which is better for your back.

After the carrots were hot, I’d dump the whole pot into the steam table, and then they’d be ready for service. The fried chicken would come with mashed potatoes (or baked potato if you paid more), a giant scoop of carrots and a garnish of a candied apple ring on a piece of iceberg lettuce. Fun fact, it took a hot minute for the chicken breasts to cook so you the server had to let the guests know that it might take a minute. Probably be a good idea to give them extra rolls or biscuits.

I was a grown ass adult, living on my own in an apartment in Atlanta before I learned that canned carrots do NOT need a cup of sugar to make them good.

Disclosure:

Adam pushes me to write, because he knows how much I love it. However, I get distracted, depressed, tired and its easier to watch Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy than to sit down at the computer and write. He came in tonight and asked me if I was writing yet and I said no. I didn’t know what to write about. And he said carrots. Write about carrots.

So, this my friends is my composition on carrots.

I hope you enjoyed.

When you’re gone, I’ll go mad. So don’t throw away this thing we had. Cuz when push comes to shove, I will kill your friends and family to remind you of my love.

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I’d like to speak to the manager!

I’ve worked for a lot of restaurnts in my restaurant career. A LOT!

My best count if my memory serves me correctly, which is doubtful these days, is 24.

During those experiences, I worked for some amazing people. I also worked for some assholes.

Keith was an asshole.

Karen was an asshole.

Mike C. was an asshole.

Christine was an asshole.

Eddie was an asshole.

David was an asshole.

Mike S. was an asshole.

When I first started managing I decided that I would emulate the manager’s I’d had who were great. And do the opposite of the manager’s I’d had who were assholes.

I’ve already listed the managers who were assholes. The managers who were great.

Danny.

A different Karen.

Reggie.

Buddie.

Deborah.

Mary.

Follow the good ones. Deny the bad ones.

This week I posted a New Times Article about the chef at the world’s greatest restaurant. NOMA. He had defied all odds, and created something very special. The restaurant was amazing and set the gold standard.

However, the chef, Rene Redzepi, set the gold standard in EVIL. He not only verbally and emotionally abused his team. He physically abused them as well. He’d punch, slap, and hit his team with items, when he decided they had failed him in some way.

I’d love to say that I didn’t understand, but when you are getting experience in the world’s greatest restaurant you turn the other cheek.

Fuck, when you are getting experience in Maine’s best restaurants you turn the other cheek. Trust me I know. Been there done that.

One of the weirdest situations ever, was at Rafferty’s on Nicholasville Road in Lexington. The General Manager’s name was Karen and she was a beast. When you think of the hospitality industry you think of people who are hospitable. She was anything but.

The Saturday, before I quit without notice, around 6:30, she started to yell for all of the staff to meet her in the walk-in. Screaming at the top of her lungs. We all jammed into the small space. It was about 20 of us. Bartenders, servers, etc. There was no one on the floor at this point.

She began to tell us all the ways we were horrible at our jobs. This went on for a good 10 minutes before she told us that if we couldn’t go out there and do a better job then perhaps we should start looking for another job.

And out we went. I knew at the time it was a shit show, and I quit the following week.

Looking back, if I had to do it over, I’d have asked her if she as general manager wasn’t the problem if her entire staff was dropping the ball. The fish rots from the head back and she was the fish head.

In NYC, I had a manager who hated me for no reason. I requested time off to go on vacation. My request, was for the end of one schedule and the first day of the next schedule. She honored my request, but a week later scheduled me on the day I was traveling home.

I called and told the management team that I would not be there as I was traveling. When I showed up for work, for my next shift, she asked to see me, to tell me that I was going to be suspended without pay for missing my shift.

I said okay. The next day I met with the GM and dropped the word harassment about 17 times. By the time I was finished, I was not only not suspended, I was guaranteed quality shifts for the next month. PS. I got her transferred to a different restaurant but that’s another story.

When I worked in Kennebunkport (this deserves its own post) I reported an owner for inappropriate behavior and the next thing I knew I was being reprimanded in the corporate office for a whole host of things that weren’t true. When I documented my experience for HR, I was asked to change the facts so they wouldn’t get in trouble with the owner.

When I worked at David’s, I was once accused of being as bad at my job as the air traffic controllers who caused the plane crash in DC with the helicopter. My restaurant manager, walked out of the meeting, and I still am still amazed at how horribly I was treated. Fun fact, when I started working for him and employee of Adam’s told him I’d last a month as his reputation was known for being someone who was volatile and mean.

The truth is, there is still a belief that hospitality workers have no rights. They should tolerate the abuse. They should tolerate the hatred. They should tolerate the insanity. Because they aren’t as important as the owners, the chefs, the bosses.

I can’t say that I’m perfect. There are things that I’ve said that embarrassed me. BUT I have never verbally assaulted an employee. I’ve never treated my staff without respect.

In the meantime, the backlash at the chef at Noma shows how the times are changing. These horrible people are a dying breed. They have outlasted their usefulness. And hopefully will be a thing of the past very soon.

In the meantime. I ask myself what Mike, David, Karen and Christine would do. Then I do the opposite. Because I’d never want to be known as the asshole boss.

I was lost for you to find. And now I’m yours and you are mine

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I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

I’ve written before about working at Bennigan’s. It was my first “real” serving job. I started there in the fall of 1987 about three months after I moved to Atlanta. I lied to get the job, saying that I had experience. I don’t think anyone ever figured it out.

What I do remember is that the staff had all been there for a while and were pretty friendly with each other.

The story I’m going to tell is about Diane. She was older than me, probably in her late 20’s. About five minutes after I started she discovered she was pregnant. From the moment she knew she was pregnant she wore maternity clothes. Well, a baggy polo and she carried herself like she was 15 months pregnant.

The larger she got, the more she embraced it, as she realized it was good for the pocket book. She embraced the belly and would do anything she could to encourage people to ask her about being pregnant.

Eventually, she had the baby. I couldn’t tell you 40 years later if it was a boy or a girl. What I do know, is that when she came back to work after giving birth, she still looked pregnant. And she continued to look pregnant for another six months. Eventually, it became so ridiculous that the manager told her it was time to have the baby, once and for all and stop being pregnant.

So she did. And from that point on, a photo of her baby, was taped to her tips trays that she presented her checks on. I have no idea, how long this went on.

It has always made me laugh to remember her waddling around the dining room, up and down the stairs six months after she gave birth.

But a girls got to do, what a girls got to do.

Oh, the stories, I still have to do share.

Snow, It won’t be long before we’ll all be there with snow. SnowI wanna wash my hands, my face, and hair with snow. SnowI long to clear a path and lift a spade of snow. Oh to see a great big man entirely made of snow.

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I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

The official weather report from tonight on Channel 6 says that Cape Elizabeth got 14” of snow on Sunday and Monday.  That’s a lot for one storm, even for us.  Although, the most we’ve had since we’ve lived in Maine is just shy of 32” in one storm.  That was intense.  

I really don’t mind the snow.  Especially now that we live in Maine.  For the most part, the cities we live in are excellent at snow removal.  Our street has a thin layer of snow packed on it, but the main roads are all clear, less than 24 hours later.   

You do have to be careful walking around town, as someone at some point decided that brick sidewalks were cool.  They are pretty.  But they are horrible to walk on when they are wet.  They are even worse in the snow.  I highly recommend not having brick sidewalks.  

I also don’t mind the cold.  In fact, I never wear a coat.  It’s in the car just in case I’m in an accident or have car trouble, but I always leave it there.  I did use it a couple of weeks ago, when I knew I had to walk about 10 blocks from the restaurant we were eating at, to the music venue we were going to.  But even then, I took it off the minute I got into the car.  

However.  

With all the photos online of the expansive snow storm, there have been a lot of pictures of sledding.  I haven’t been sledding since 1993.  It’s one of those weird things I know, simply because there is photographic evidence of it. 

There was a huge snowstorm that closed the University of Kentucky campus for the day.   At least five or six of the tech students ended up in the show and we made makeshift sleds.  I can’t remember if we were using plastic, cardboard or metal.  What I do know is that it was great for sledding.  

We hit the hills outside of the theater building.  Fun was had by all.  

I was wearing my big red winter coat that I loved.  And my boyfriend, Sam and I were taking turns going down the hill.  At one point, we went down the hill together, and unbeknownst to us a photographer from the Lexington Herald-Leader took a photo of us. 

The next day we were in the paper.  

We were newspaper famous the next day, as we all got back to our regularly scheduled programming.  

Also, unbeknownst to me, Sam had reached out the newspaper and gotten a copy of the photo.  For my birthday, the next month, I got the framed photo of us sledding on campus.  It’s been displayed prominently; in every apartment I’ve had since. 

I’m way too old to go sledding now.  I’d end up breaking a hip and you know what they say.  But, the photo is a reminder here in Maine that I don’t mind the winter.  We put up with the intense cold and snow so that we can have the most beautiful summers and falls anyone as ever seen.  

I got ssssteam heat, but I need your love to keep away the cold

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I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

It’s currently 6* in Portland.  That’s very cold.  Even for us. 

I talk about Maine winters a lot.  And while yes, they’re long and cold.  It’s not ridiculously cold like it is in the Midwest.  And thanks to climate change, we get a lot less snow than we used to, although this weekend is going to challenge that statistic.  

And, even though we don’t get as much snow as we used to, the city and state, are well versed in snow removal.  The snow will start Sunday afternoon and by Monday morning, the roads should be drivable, if not clear depending on when the snow stops.  Within 24 of a total stop, the highways and main roads will look as though the snow never happened.  

That being said, it’s still cold.  Very cold. 

Adam and I are lucky that we live in a fairly warm house, and we have the ability to set the thermostat on a temperature than can be comfortable for both of us.  That has not always been the case for either of us.  

In NYC, the heat comes on in October and goes off in April.  And it’s set at a constant temperature of just a few degrees cooler than that sun.  Old school radiator heat, that is for the most part either on or off.  If it’s on, you are sweating the moment you walk into the house.  Off is a little trickier.  If the valve works you can turn off the radiator, but you chance it never coming back on again.  Thus, your heat is on, your windows are open, and the a/c is running in the middle of January.  

Growing up, we lived in an old farm house, heated by a fuel oil stove in the dining room and a wood stove in the living room.  It was either cold, or slightly more cold, depending on the weather.  I always said, that when I was an adult, I’d never be hot in the summer or cold in the winter and we are lucky that that is true now.  

My favorite thermostat story, is when I lived in Lexington, going to school at UK.  My boyfriend and I rented the downstairs of an old four-square house.  It was beautiful, with tall ceilings, hardwood floors and lots of windows.  Beautiful, but very cold.  It was always freezing.  

To make matters worse the landlord had locked the thermostat so that we couldn’t adjust the heat.  We suffered through this for about a month, when my boyfriend came up with a solution.  We took the freezable plastic blocks that you use in a cooler instead of ice, and put them in a plastic grocery bag.  We then nailed the bag so that it would hang on top of the thermostat.  Instant heat.  

I lived there two winters and we did this the whole time.  Not a perfect solution but a work around all the same.  

Another fun story about that house, was that it had three separate apartments in the house.  One on the first floor, one on the second floor and another on the third floor.  However, the basement is where all the utilities were, including heat, hot water and electric breakers.  

At the beginning of our second year, we got new upstairs neighbors.  And from day one, they had parties, late into the night every Thursday.  The first couple of times we asked them to be a little quieter and they basically just ignored us.  We were about a month into the school year, when I’d had enough.  

During the next late-night party, I went downstairs to the basement, and turned off the breakers to their apartment.  The music and noise stopped.  I went back upstairs to bed.  When my alarm went off at 8:00, I returned their power.  It only took doing this two times, for the Thursday night parties to stop. 

They never complained and I started being able to sleep.  

I have so many wonderful stories about the house on Stone Avenue.  But those will have to wait for another day.  

The water is wide and I can’t cross over, Neither have I wings that I could fly. Build me a boat that can carry two, and both shall row my love and I.

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I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

Now I lay me down to sleep.
I pray the Lord my soul to keep.
If I should die before I wake.
I pray the lord my soul to take.

This poem scared the fuck out of me as a child. Seriously.

I was convinced that the poem was for kids. And as a result, kids only died while they were asleep. I was sure that one night I was going to go to sleep and never wake up.

In fact, in 5th grade, I tried to measure my breathing to the point that I couldn’t catch my breath. I was hyperventilating and finally left my bed to tell my parents that I couldn’t breathe. My mom immediately called our doctor. I don’t know what they said to each other, but she told me to go back to bed. I did and fell asleep a little while later.

I’m less afraid of dying in 2026, than I was in 1975. I’m supposing that getting old does that to a person. The closer I get to that day, the less afraid I am. It’s a fact of life. Something that all of us have to go through. Whether we like it or not.

It doesn’t scare me either to think that I don’t believe in god. I’m not sure what happens after we die, but I’m convinced there aren’t angels on high singing, while I sit on a puffy white cloud.

Years ago, I came up with the idea that life as we know it is but a dream. A very vivid, realistic dream. And when we die, we awake in another reality. One were life is different yet the same.

I don’t know if I believe this now, but it’s easy to hold on to. I think now, we just pass into another plain. Wrapping my head around how complicated this existence is, makes it even harder to wrap my head around the next.

And I can’t believe in god. Not the almighty god that was preached to me in my youth and during my formative years. There is no way, an all caring loving god would let the shit that happens in our world happen. And I have no interest in a cruel god that created the trauma in the first place.

So, I live in my bubble. Try to do the right things. Try to love with all my heart. And hope for the best.

Meanwhile, if you are a parent, read your kids a story and for the love of all things do NOT teach them this prayer. It’s scary. And it’s not nice.

Amen.

Stuck all week on a lady’s lap, nothing to do but yawn and nap. Can you blame me if I yap?

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I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

Family pets.  

We all have them.  Most of us grew up with them.  

A few people I know had sociopaths for parents and weren’t allowed to love an animal.  Not even a hamster. 

In my childhood, we had many pets.  Pedro is the first pet I can truly remember, although I know he was not the first.  He was a tiny, tiny chihuahua.   He loved my mother unconditionally.  And he would lose his mind when my Aunt Debbie, would tell my little brother to cry.  Something she enjoyed doing.  He would cry, and Pedro would get mad.  

As is with the case of a lot of chihuahuas, Pedro could also be mean.  If he didn’t like you, he had no use for you.  I don’t know that he ever bit anyone, but he certainly tried. 

The first real tragedy of my childhood, was sitting on the front steps of my house in Paynes Depot, Kentucky and watching a car squish our little 5-pound Pedro.  My Aunt pulled him from the road, and I stood next to her watching him die.  

Now you might ask, why was little Pedro in the road, well I wish I could tell you.  But I can’t.  I do know that I cried for several days.  

Cindy came next.  

I remember this perfectly well.  

I yelled at my mother that Pedro was fighting with the dog next door.  He belonged to my aunt and uncle.  What I didn’t realize till later was that they weren’t fighting.  My mom tossed water on them to “break” it up.  

We got puppies for Thanksgiving.   

We got Cindy.  My Aunt Doo got Toji, and I’m not sure what happened to the others.  

Cindy was special.  She loved us all, but once again, was attached to my mom.  She lived until she was 17 or so.  She was euthanized while I was at college, and my parents didn’t tell me until I came home for Christmas.  Of course, by that time, she was mostly blind, had no teeth, and had long stopped going outside for bathroom breaks.  

When I was in sixth grade we got Fiesty.  She was Cindy’s puppy and I have no idea who the father was.  She was the runt of the litter.  Hyper and funny.  And sweet as could be.  She also lived a nice long life.  

That was not true of all of our pets.  

When I was in first grade we had a white dog.  I don’t remember his name.  I’m not even sure he was a he.  I don’t remember a lot about him at all.  

What I do remember, is that it was summer, and I was spending the day with my stepfather, on the horse farm he worked on.  

It was a beautiful day.  The sun was shining.  The sky was blue.  We took his blue VW Beetle up the hill to go to work.  When we left, the dog was running around in the field next to our trailer, tied to the fence.  

Fast forward about four hours.  We take the tractor and wagon, down the hill to the trailer we lived in.  

I saw it first.  The dog wasn’t running anymore.  He was hanging from the fence post.  He had jumped over the fence and when he did so, the chain caught on the fence.  He’d been strangled to death.  

My stepfather, never said a word.  We went into the house and had lunch.  And when we finished lunch, we went back to the tractor and wagon.  I sat there and watched has he unhooked the chain and then tossed the dog on the back of the wagon.  

Without speaking, we drove to the back of the 80-acre farm and he tossed the dog onto a rock wall.  It was unceremonious.  It was not spoken of.  He just tossed the dog on the wall and we drove away.  

I’ve thought about that day a lot over the years.  What I was supposed to to think?   Would I do the same thing as an adult.  

What I do know is the dog deserved better.  I deserved better.  

And that’s not even the worst of the pet stories.  

Fame, I’m gonna live for ever!

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I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

Thirty years ago, I taught lighting D]design at the Cincinnati School for Creative and Performing Arts.  I started there in the fall of 1995 and left at the end of the 1998 school year.  

I learned more from my students and co-workers than I ever dreamed about teaching.  That being said, it was a great experience and I value the friendships of the people I met during that three-year period of my life. 

It was an interesting time to be there, as the school was going through a transition.  The founders of the school had just left, for an array of different reasons, and a new principal, artistic director and slew of teachers were being brought in.  

Myself, and the scenery design teacher both started at the same time.  We were tossed into the fire together, and both worked to make the program the best it could be.  He is still doing a great job there, by the way.  

I can’t speak to things now, but in 1995, I spent the morning teaching 7th and 8th graders intro to lighting.  And I spent the afternoon teaching 9th – 12th graders lighting design.  Everything from how to change a lamp in a lighting instrument and how to hang a light, then to how to create a design and implement it.  

As I said, we taught each other a lot.  

The thing I found most interesting was that while we were a performing arts high school, not everyone embraced this fact.  I remember going to the 12th grade English teacher to propose a combined unit on Macbeth, where we taught in tandem her focusing on the literary importance and me on the design components.  I was emphatically told no.  

Our principal at the time was also a piece of work.  I don’t remember the year, but myself and the scenery design teacher came to work one morning to find that the principal had ordered the custodians to empty the prop room.  To her it was a disorganized mess, and she felt it looked badly on her.  When we got there that morning all the props from storage were in the dumpster. 

I kid you not.  

With out asking we salvaged what we thought was important.

I discovered a set of mid-century dishes in the trash.  Franciscan Starburst Stoneware.  With the help of my students, we pulled it out of the trash and I took it home with me.  It was the start of a life time of collecting Franciscan stoneware.  

Fun fact about the Starburst pattern, 30 years later it would be worth hundreds of dollars.  It’s a serious collector’s item as we moved in the 21st century.  I still have those dishes, and have supplemented them when I have found them in various antique stores along the way.  

Adam and I use our Franciscan dishware all the time.  For all the major holidays.  Our cat’s food bowls are starburst and Ferndel dishes.  His mother gave us her wedding dishware which was the Desert Rose Franciscan pattern .  And we bought Indian Summer dishes 13 years ago.  

I have a friend whose mother gave him a complete 10 piece place setting array of Starburst dishware.  On eBay it would easily be worth several thousand dollars.  He jokes that it’s his retirement plan.  

For us, it’s our daily lives.  It goes in the dishwasher.  It’s durable.  And we love it.  

The best part of the principal cleaning out the prop room, was that I claimed it as my office for a year.  It had a loft and tons of book shelves.  For my students it was  a kind of  clubhouse for a year.  Complete with a sofa, a lava lamp that a student eventually broke. (It’s hard to clean up the liquid from a lava lamp) and hours of bonding with kids who needed a grown up to pay attention to them.  

My students have followed different paths.  It’s crazy to think they are in the late 40’s now.  And I’m proud to say, several went on to be successful theater professionals. 

I will never know how I affected their lives, but for those reading this, you changed my life for good, to quote Wicked.  

Start spreading the news!

/ fightmasterwrites / Leave a comment

I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

Happy New Year!

For five years I worked at the Hard Rock Café in Times Square NYC.  It was a very lucrative job, and it afforded me the ability to pay my rent, as well as take time off to design shows that came my way.  

There were 120+ servers on the schedule, and 75% of them all had side gigs going on.  Artists, models, musicians, actors, comedians, and the list goes on.  On any given busy night there would be 40+ servers on the floor.  The restaurant sat around 800 people at one time and was often on a 2 hour wait.  There were nights that you’d run into a co-worker in the dish pit that you didn’t even know was working that shift.  

The Hard Rock was known for doing lots of events throughout the year, but the big event was New Year’s Eve.  We were closed to the public and did a private party for one of the sponsors for the Times Square ball drop.  It was a very all hands on deck kind of event, and I was scheduled almost every year.  

As a manager, I love working events.  As a server, I’d rather get a root canal.  Every year, I’d scheme to get out of the shift, and it never happened.  In 2009, my first New Year’s Eve with Adam, I paid a co-worker 50 bucks to work my shift so that I could spend the evening with him.

The next year, we were in Texas, and I managed to be off.  

The years preceding Adam, I always took the cut.  Around 11:00 they’d ask for volunteers to go home and I’d always say yes.  I hated being there, and I hated being in the crowd trying to get home.  

However, in 2011, Adam and I had just gotten back from Maine, where we’d spent Christmas.  On Christmas Day, my friend’s Lisa and Michelle, along with myself, sat Adam down and did an intervention.  We explained to him that he was moving to Maine the followiong summer, and just to embrace it.  After about 30 minutes he craved, and the plan was put into motion that got us moved to the northeast.  

When we got home, I was of course scheduled to work New Year’s Eve.  This year was different.  Although, I’d not yet given my notice, I knew that this would be my last New Year’s Eve in NYC.  And although, I hated working events I was excited to work New Year’s Eve 2011.  Because the Hard Rock Café is at the base of the building where the ball drops.  And for all my years in NYC, I’d never been in Times Square to watch the ball drop.  

So in 2011, when volunteers were asked to speak up, I didn’t volunteer.  At 11:45 for the first time ever, I was present, when the staff gathered on the sidewalk in front of the restaurant.  And at 11:59:59, I watched the ball being to descend, I experienced the playing of New York, New York, I saw the confetti fly, as all of my co-workers hugged each other. 

Somewhere on this laptop, I have the video of that night saved.  It is buried in files and files of photos off lots of different phones and cameras I’ve had since grad school.  I have looked for the last three days, but have yet to be able to find it.  I’ve found lots of other fun surpriseds, but not the video.  

I’m glad that I worked that night.  I’m glad before I left the city for good that I got to see the ball drop.  It’s one of those New York City memories that I will always cherish.