Possibilites

This is a day full of possibilites. Ever thought about what that really means?

It means those mechanics across the sunny morning rush of taffic might somehow cross my path today , and their gray overalls might become intricately connected with my blue Pot Belly shirt in this social circle of life.

Ever thought about how many chance encounters we experience in any one given day?

There were the countless cars of purposeful people we passed only minutes ago (we being my mother and I). My dear mother patted her highly-piled hair and dropped me off at Caribou Coffee, so I could properly enjoy my remaining hour before work.

I am so in love with these wooden tables and this bitter, heavily-sugared coffee. I am in love with the two police officers drinking ocffee near the door that gave me "the nod" when I entered, and the younger one that gave me a smile of appreciation. Well, it was either appreciation, or he found it amusing that I opened the door, felt a sneeze coming, shut the door and waited, sneezed, and then entered my favorite, as of yet uncontaminated, coffee shop.

$1.73. That's worth this atmosphere, wouldn't you say? But enough of me. I'm taking away all the mystery of this random blogging & coffee morning. What a wonderful way to begin the morning, though! Celebrate the last day I work at Pot Belly. I honestly don't know that I'll miss it too much. I'm ready to move on. I'm ready to soar on these unknown clouds to the Jazzy tunes of the '20's. Past or future... I don't care where I go!

I wish I could describe something unique. As it is, in my effort to obtain privacy, I am in the corner of this Caribou Coffee place all by myself, left to the checker marks on the high wooden table, the rush of sunny traffic out the window to my right, and the spectacularly clean window directly in front of me which looks out on...parking lot. lol.

A young boy just waddled up, and with him a significantly chubbier, younger, and more clueless little boy you will never see. I say clueless because it took him 5 minutes to look up at me and stare curiously, whereas the other, more persceptive boy has been watching me with open curiosity upon sighting me.

Beyond a smile and a 'hi', I'm ignoring them both, because the worst thing is befriending a strangers' children. Why? Because when the stranger finally arrives (which she just did) she would naturally be suspicious of her children's new found friend. But... maybe that's just my own paranoia. Maybe it's what I automatically think of other people who are friendly with strangers. I'm suspicious. I'm thinking "Where's your motive? What do you have to gain? What do YOU want? Who do you think you are?" I don't know why I always put myself through such drama. I'm so used to being behind a counter when I talk with strangers, that I'm slightly uncertain of what people want from me/think of me when I can't give them food. I have no REASON to talk to them. So why should I put myself through something unnecessary when I'm not even certain they will WANT to talk to me?

Thus, our social circles continue to be intricately combined, but thinly separated by a certain sense of individual pride. I, like many people, am prone to find a private corner, and observe life from a distance... imagining myself in it... imagining myself as that middle-aged mother who watches her children and answers their pertinent toy questions, beginning with a "Yes, hon," when they cry, "Mama," helpless of solving their own simple problems.

I can't imagine such a responsibility. CHILDREN. How does one answer every question and love them supremely above all else? The latter seems inevidably eaiser. No? Yes?

My parents always pointed me to the Bible. That was the answer to... everything. And if the answer wasn't written clearly, there was always some applicable principle. I suppose even now that teaching guides me. I see myself in the reflection and know I am similar to all these people rushing with places to go, and yet... I am different. Different from them ALL. Somehow I must know and understand myself in order to understand random people. People keep to themselves because it's easier. At least, these are the people I know up north. I don't know. Do people change as one goes south of this land?

I do believe people change according to their environment. Not always. But there is a change in people when they are faced with different circumstances. Like this coffee shop. It makes me sentimental. And yet, I've always had a POTENTIAL for sentiments within me. This place, a pen, and paper, just reveal and document it.

* NOTE * This entry was written on Wednesday, August 27, my last day of work at Pot Belly (thank you, God), and just 3 days before I leave for college. I fly down south on the 30th and say goodbye to cold, drafty, northern winter, and HELLO to rainy, muggy, warmer weather. ;) I have mixed feelings about it all... even I cannot decipher what it is I am thinking about.... COLLEGE. It seems big and looming and mean. Everyone just keeps telling me it's so humiliating to be a freshman, and you know what I said? TOUGH. Every one there was a freshman at one point. The only thing that separates them from me and it, is time. Same with 7th grade. Wasn't highschool a little frightening to enter into, too? And what about kindergarten? I don't remember having any fears, but I hear it's a terror to begin school for the first time EVER. So I've gotten this far. I figure I'll make it. Might even have fun. ;) Anyways, I'm sure I'll talk to you guys later before I leave. Been kinda busy, as you might guess. If you want to contact me, feel free to comment here, or email me at countrygirlstyle@gmail.com. I will do what I can to filter through my stalkers, and reply to those of you who are good, upstanding people who just happen to read my... very long blog. ;) No, seriously, though. Thanks for reading.

My Sure Escape

Right. So the days have been hectic, so don't judge me for like not writing.... more than five articles this month.

I have few complaints. (Note: I did not say NO complaints - proves I'm still human). Work at PotBelly has been going rather well, but like any job it has both severe negatives and soaring positives. My manager has taken to yelling at me a lot, and I wince at the customers and wish I had the nerve to say, "He's always like that."

My greatest fault is that if I notice a need, my first instinct is to run and meet the need (which leaves my own station unattended) (thus the yelling). I'm still getting the whole highly useful 'assembly line' thing down. I preferr to banter with the fun loving customers and hand them a hot steamy sandwich made with love. (As opposed to briskly handing them a dry sandwich and shooing them towards the cash register). I have since learned that many people don't know how to experience things AS THEY GO. They can't walk slowly through the crowd. Such people care very little for a sandwich made with love, and that is one of the most disgusting type of people I have to make sandwiches for.

Back to my problems. I have one particularly loud-mouthed co-worker who often likes to point out my countless faults in front of customers. Here's a good example. I'm talking to a customer and then she comes up to me and saucily tells me, "Less lip, more grip." I was like, "What? That doesn't even make sense." According to her, I talk too much. Okay, but that was a horribly lame way to say it.

Otherwise, I have learned to generally keep to myself. I did allow myself one huge religious/political debate involving myself, a gay guy, and a guy who studied to be a Rabbi. That got rather heated and I kept laughing because it got so absurdly funny. You'll be glad to know the gay guy and the Rabbi found it amusing as well, so as far as I know I wasn't written up. Otherwise, most people I come into contact with are politically dull and too busy and important to have opinions and share them with a low-life PotBelly sandwich attendant. Admittedly, I have run into a Lowes manager who had a lively political debate with me, but it was almost dissapointing because he agreed with me too much. I like to disagree vehemently and see if they have as good an argument for their beliefs as I hope I have for mine.

Anyways, I'm going to share a poem thingy that I wrote a long time ago that pretty much defines how I'm feeling right now. This summer is stretching on and on.... Admitedly I'm normally not a basket-case when it comes to new things, but this waiting thing is about to kill me! Let the moment I step on my college campus be here! Let people stop telling me how nice it will be for me down there, and how successful I will be in life! I am willing to wager that the summer before one launches out on ones own, is THE longest feeling 3 months one will ever experience. I am pretty confident in saying this, because adults wiser and much older than myself have been telling me that 'once I begin college, life will fly by'. I wanted to say, "Thank you, that was significantly pessimistic, but may I say I am more than ever ready to launch off into the unknown."

Right now, the 'unknown' consists of 'what cheap, adorable, yet durable laptop can I find?', and 'should I splurge and buy school books?' The future and God alone know the answers.

I am stuck here.
In this long day,
With the irrepressible urge to find a bathroom,
And yet not willing to risk
Missing the very minute my ride arrives.
I have watched the road silently,
Sipping my cold ice water,
And longing for relief from
Strange surroundings.
I need to see something familiar,
Something I can kick and call home.
I need to see our little tan Prism,
Or our big hulky blue van,
Rolling towards me with
A familiar knight in shining armor at the wheel.
I want my car to be red,
So that car rolling towards me now,
Will be mine.
My sure escape.

Really, though, if you think about it... If a car were to come pick me up and take me away from all of my problems, I would just find myself in another situation that contains problems. Difficult situations are unavoidable, I suppose, so that means that one has to find the answers to ones internal problems instead of always dragging them along in some kind of pathetic version of a getaway car. Am I right?

Fascinating Friday Learning Experiences

I'm presently drinking sugar-free hot chocolate. Imagine the ecstatic face that I'm making as a result. The drink was my brother's master-piece creation. How can I not like it?

Anyways, so Happy Friday!! Today dawned brightly, full of fresh possibilites, and endless opportunities. (At least if a customer dares ask me how my day is going, that is what I say.) I have so many interests. It keeps life from getting bland and predictable. One of my many interests, is an interest in languages. Grace, my Korean boss, accuses me of being a linguist with something akin to pride and fear. She told my German friend that, 'withen Andilea, no keeping secrets. She knowing.' Ahaha, I could not hold the laughter in. What irony! Grace and I often have misunderstandings when speaking English, but when I listen carefully and spew back a couple of her Korean words, she says I 'scaring her' because I understand what she's saying. That makes me smirk. I tease that there's a nymph between us, taking her English words and distorting them before they get to me. After all, any place you work with humans, there will be misunderstandings. It has gotten especially amusing at times like when Grace ordered, "Getting Mariana sauce, sweetie." And I then set about looking for Banana sauce in a state of confusion.

There is a woman named Kathy who gets a large coffee every morning at work, and over time we have begun greeting each other in German. German is her first language (although lost since childhood), and with my few Pimsleur-memorized phrases, we are slowly building up our German vocabulary. Anyways, I like Kathy. If any of you, my dearest readers, have ever had a customer service job, you know that one of the most refreshing things about customer service is having a regular customer with whom you lose the formalities and actually talk human. Kathy is one such down-to-earth person who probably has a world of knowledge beyond me, but slows down every morning to laugh at herself in German and swap a few simple phrases with me. There's something triumphant in our smiles when we finish flourishing our limited German vocabulary.
"Gutentag!" Hello!
"Eh, Gutenmorgen!" Eh, Good morning!
"Ve guets?" How's it going?
"Es guet mia gut, danke. Unt ze?" It goes to me well. And you?
"Zia gut, danke." Very good, thank you.
Today our new phrase was, "Ist Fritag!" It's Friday!
"Ist Freelich Fritag!" It's Happy Friday!
I totally butchered the spelling there, but you get the idea. My other customers look on with a mixture of awe and apprehension, but she and I are often too wrapped up in self-satisfaction to notice. Mornings with Kathy have convinced me that sometimes some of the simplest accomplishments in life are the sweetest. Anyways, I love languages. That's just something you didn't know about me.

I feel like sighing. Politics are boring me right now. I thought that two-faced baby from India was altogether fascinating, though. A bit freaky, but intriguing. Poor little thing. Yet she probably doesn't even know what she has been born into. How can one escape such a fate? Where one face would smile on being an Indian goddess, would the other face be berated by the glare of the spectators' spot-light? You wonder if she is one soul, or two in one body. And what would it be like to see out of both sides of your head? Pretty awesome, I would imagine! Although, if I had been born with two faces I would probably have accepted double sight by now because I would have never known anything different. I can't imagine having two faces, though. But hey, twice the smile, twice the talking! At that, my brother would groan proffusely, I am without doubt. When I mentioned all of this phenomenon to my mother, she sniffed, "I already know plenty of two-faced people." I laughed. Good point.

I am sighing now. It's kind of a warped sigh/yawn. Time to sign out, turn the covers, and click out the light. Tomorrow's my second day at PotBelly! Wish me fascinating learning experiences! G'Night.

Brilliant Tuesday Concepts

Right now I am sitting at my computer, glaring holes into the screen. My brother is watching a loud film (where someone with amnesia is constantly having loud 'flashbacks') and rustling bags of 'sugar-free' candy. About 5 minutes ago he happened to look over at his dormant little sister and made a face. "Why are there Q-tips sticking out of your ears?" See, that's the thing about men that I've learned. They see the surface problem and think 'uh, how wierd'. But they don't understand that what they see is just a symptom of the real problem. In fact, I can't concentrate on writing this blog while all of his noise is echoing about. So I am muting out that noise, while also cleaning out my ears. It serves a dual purpose, that on first glance, most men would not pick up on.

Earlier this afternoon, I was lounging blissfully in my lazyboy, meditating on school, when a rather profound concept hit me. What people know the most about, they want to talk the most about. Simple enough, but often forgotten. Really, if one gets this concept down, one is helped immensely when trying to understand people. Think about it. Why else do so many people love to talk about themselves at first opportunity? Why does someone knowledgeable about nutrition tend to sneak a nutritional fact into every meal-time? Why do writers love to go to writers conferences and talk to other writers about their writing? I told this to the woman from which I off-springed from and she said, "So what do you like to talk about?"
I had to think about that. Hmm. I replied, "I guess I like to talk about everything. I have alot of interests in alot of things. I like to hear what alot of people have to say. I like to soak up as much knowledge as possible."
"So does that mean you know it all?" My mother's brow furrowed. "Andria, you need to watch how you come across."
I laughed with delight. People pleasure in accusing me of being a know-it-all, but I've found that I'm most often accused only when I insert an opinion that didn't promote their own knowledge. Hah, see it's all in how you look at it. I don't feel a need to defend myself. I'm pleased that I don't really know it all, because that leaves me room for learning more brilliant things in this old life I am presently subjected to.

Another thing I realized starkly tonight, is that I really appreciate good customer service. There is such a thing as a 'friendly atmosphere'. I've walked into some department stores, and I feel immediately like the employees there are telling me with their eyes, "Leave. Make my job easier and leeeeave." Tonight I experienced such at the TJ Max department store. Some kids about my age were wearing little TJ Max shirts and were putting clothes on racks at the rate of molasses. When I went to the fitting room, accusing glittery eyes flitted over me and a terse voice said, "Put the clothes on the rack." The girl then counted the clothes, and I felt instantly like I was being searched for some indescrepancy. When there was no indescrepancy found she handed me a number briskly and then went back to sitting in her roller chair and staring at her long fingernails. I was like 'okay?', but said 'Thank you' politely. She grunted. I felt like grunting back, but refrained. I just didn't get it. She could have at least pretended to be nice. I felt like I was in an environment that did not want me, the customer, to enjoy liesurely bargain shopping. It was TJ Max's good fortune that I found something half-way agreeable and decided to purchase it. I walked to the counter and the boss of the employed TJ Max children smiled at me somewhat like an obliging school-marm. "What can I do for you?" she asked crisply, and I felt it was pretty obvious that I was in line because I wanted to purchase something. I put some pants on the counter and still could not shake this feeling that I was a bother at that counter. It was so wierd. It wasn't until I donated a dollar to 'autism' that she actually smiled at me and seemed sincere in helping me. Walking into places like that, I am just so thankful for fun places like PotBelly and Grace's where I can have fun doing work and can actually delight in seeing customers walk into my restaurants. But maybe it's all different at clothing stores. I suppose no regulars go to Kohls to get clothes every morning before they head off to work. That's why I love food stores. I remember as a child when I would stay home 'sick' from kindergarten. My mom would read Berenstein bears books to me, I would watch 'Whinnie the Pooh', and then if macaroni and cheese wasn't on the menu, my mother would take me out to McDonalds for lunch. That was extremely exciting for me, and my mother warned that I shouldn't tell my brother or he would get jealous. Of course, I waited a few days, and then got mad at my brother for something and told him in anticipation of that jealousy. La, such a wicked child. But even in all that wickedness, I found pure unadultrated delight in getting a simple chicken mcnuggets, fries, and coke. Food is exciting; temperal, but then again - all pleasure is. That decides it. My place is among food.

What brilliance I stumble on while I am writing to you! What would I do without words, people, food, Q-tips and the ability to love...

La... What a beeootiful Saturday... Live, Live, Live

I'm going to free-write here, so you (my dear readers) are well-warned. Today I was very ambitious! I started a second job today! Yay- first days! I love first days. Initially on first days I always feel apprehensive, and I have big bad thoughts about all these things that could go wrong. Predictably, I felt that way today - being my first day and all. But there's something awesome about first days. One doesn't have to be afraid to fail. If one does fail, one can smile demurely and whisper, "Tis my first day. Do accept my pardons." That sounds wierd, but picture me saying it and it'll be okay.

My new job is at Potbelly (a Sandwich-with-the-works store). I worked all day today before I finally had my first official Potbelly Sandwich. It felt funny because I was garbed in this huge Potbelly t-shirt and had a Potbelly visor, but I didn't even know where to stand in line. The lady who helped me - my new coworker! - was amply-sized and had a no-nonsense face. She was one of the many new co-workers I was to meet. When I first saw her, I thought, "Oh dear, she's going to take an instant dislike to me." At first she ignored me and I felt quite non-existent. But then half-way through my day, she looked at me sharply and said, "Have you been checking the bathroom every 30 minutes?" I nodded responsibly and said, "12:00, 12:30 and we're just coming up on 1:00 here." She smiled and said, "I knew I was going to like you the minute I saw you." I felt pleased but did not venture to tell her what I had thought when I first saw her.

My boss warned me that "first days are never glamorous". I nodded, took that with a grain of salt, and set about my tasks with a shy fervor. Basically, after going through orientation and getting the 'official tour' of the place, I was assigned to keep people's tables clean, sweep the floors, sanitize baskets and trays, take peoples' trash, and check the bathrooms every 30 minutes for total toilet-paper efficiency. They called the position a 'fronter', and I was the 'fronter associate' of the day. When I told my friend Kim that, she said, "Oh, so you're like a bus-boy." Groan - but it made me laugh and I clarified, "I'm the best bus-woman around."

Anyways, so I now have two jobs. That's kinda cool. I was warned by my Potbelly boss that I was not allowed to take Potbelly secrets and share them with Grace at my other job. Hahaha, I wanted to laugh. I couldn't steal secrets even if I wanted to. I'm one of those who just knows good food when I taste it. And today, I had some mighty good sandwich food. My mom's a southern cook -- quite good, in fact. Grace is a Korean cook -- extremely good and in some cases just downright unique. Then, to top it all off, I'm a pretty good cook myself if I'm allowed to say so. I make a mean batch of Ramen noodles and baked potatoes. Watch out, future hubby.

It's funny because my boss thought I was married for the majority of my orientation. I thought it was wierd because he kept referring to my 'hubby' and my 'significant other' and then I realized that I would have to clarify my state of singleness or I would be introduced to my coworkers as "Mrs. Andria so-and-so..." La, that seems so laughable.

Anyways, so I was exhausted after that first five-hour shift, but it was a new experience for me! I love learning new things! I can now ask people for trash with the utmost efficiency, and I can clean off tables in a sort of mesmerizing dance-like fury. La I'm laughing at myself. All week I've been so tired and I've just wanted to go to bed, and then suddenly it's like... hey, I'm living. This is life. Whoo! See, you gotta make it happen. Don't expect it to all come crawling to you. Live, live, live.

More later. Expect it, dear readers of mine.