This is real world.  Grab hold and fight back or you’re gonna get ran over.

Let me tell you about my first big boy job that began my food service industry journey.   Now outside of that concession stand at the neighborhood pool and several locally famous lifeguard gigs, I was accustomed to basically getting paid to tan myself. I did learn the magnificence of frying and ice cube, but that’s a whole ‘another story.

I had managed to find myself falling short of my scholastic goals due to, ahem, irresponsible behavior, and was back living with the parents.  Being the youngest of three, mom and dad had been enjoying the empty nest and made it clear that I could come home long enough to get my feet on the ground.  My sister was working at a locally loved and successful restaurant and said she’d ask the kitchen manager/food supervisor if he’d take me on with no experience.  Like any good manager, he told her to have me come in and talk to him.

I remember that day clearly.  I had on a pair of red, white and black leather Chuck Taylors, jean shorts and a black 26red shirt with a zipper up the front.  This manager I spoke to was a fucking hulk.  He was way taller than me, way big than me, way louder than me and could care less about the swimming records I had back in college.  What he did care about was I had reliable transportation, I lived close by and I spoke English.  My sister was a great employee and had a circle of friends all working there. They were all reliable and dependable so he lumped me in through association as having morals and a good work ethic.  I was told to come back in a two days at 9am wearing black pants, work shoes and any shirt as I would be given a jacket and chef hat.  I’d start off washing dishes and be given a few prep shifts.  Easy enough.

True to my nature, regardless of the irresponsible and self-destructive decisions I had now been making daily practice, I showed up about fifteen minutes early.  That turned out to be a good thing as I had no idea how to get in the building.  The doors were locked.  I panicked.  How the hell was I supposed to get in the building if the front doors are locked?  Should I just go home? Should I bang on the doors? Are they not open today? I stress smoked a few cigarettes cursing myself for being here instead of back at the college with my friends and classmates.  I looked towards the rear of the building and noticed a few cars had gathered there and a couple people in black pants and t-shirts were entering the building through the rear.  Lesson one; you don’t walk in the front like a paying customer you dumbass, you’re part of the crew now.

Walking into a restaurant with zero experience is a bit daunting.  I imagine it is like being on the TV show Naked and Afraid.  Your environment is essentially trying to kill you; everything is either razor sharp or scalding hot.  Everything around you is edible but you’re too scared to ingest anything.  On top of that, the people surrounding you both loathe you and need you at the same time and some are either trying to shove anything remotely phallic inside you or trying to trick you into looking at their own genitalia.  You either adapt and conquer or you go away.

As the days went by I cut and burned myself, one painful lesson at a time.  I overcooked eight whole lip-on butts of Prime Rib.  I burned a twenty gallon batch of marinara and prepared chicken salad with undercooked chicken.  I didn’t store things properly, put away pans that were still dripping wet and turned a corner holding a knife in such a way it impaled the forty pound block of cheese a prep cook was holding in front of his chest as he walked across the kitchen.  While others had work pants and work boots, I wore corduroys and Timberlands as it was all I had.  I froze to a purple hue as I would never remember to bring a sweatshirt to put up the big deliveries.  Had it not been for my sister, I would’ve been shown the door several times over.  Had it not been for my desire to buy weed and make my parents think I was trying to make something of myself, I would have quit just as many times over.  My supervisors would shake their heads at me constantly with disapproval.  The big boss would encourage the good employees with “get off, dawg!” and look at me with a “either learn or go ahead and quit please”  stare.  At the time I didn’t realize how lucky I was.

Although struggling in my newly chosen industry, my ego was getting the best of me. Very simply put, I considered myself to be better than all the employees, including the managers.  Not with my work performance, obviously, but because I was smarter than  all of them.  I had gone through some college, graduated high school near the top of the class.  I was too good for this and it pissed me off I was the lowest on the totem pole of what I viewed to be a bunch of degenerates.  I avoided conversation as these peasants were insulting to be around.  I just put my head down and bulldozed my way through each shift.  Weird thing happened with that though.  I started to become good at my job.

As I put my self-glorified intelligence to use, I was able to find ways to get many things done at once.  The prep kitchen was a dream for a prep cook; ovens, a smoker, two different tilt skillets…plenty of tools.  As a prep cook I had items needed to be done in a certain priority, but I would maximize my efficiency by using the entire kitchen.  I would push myself to see how much I could do at once.  Before long I went from the inexperienced guy that needed his hand held to get through a five to six item prep list to a very reliable, self-governed employee that would knock out twelve to fifteen items and also work ahead for the next shift.  It was gratifying.  Plus the other employees and managers were noticing.

While my work gelled into the level of those around me, so did my personality.  Forget about the backgrounds, I was learning a key element of restaurant employees. We are from everywhere.  I was surrounded by what you could call hood rats and rednecks but also students.  And teachers.  A pair of twin brothers.  An ex-college football player.  A couple of immigrants with limited English speaking ability.  But deep down to the core, we are all people.  Making it.  Relying on each other.  Arguing like a family through a shift but coming together and having each others’ backs when the time comes.  I would see a couple employees that genuinely hated each other come together to get the work objective done.  There were many life lessons to be learned in a restaurant.  It doesn’t matter where you are from, we are all at the same place now.  And life doesn’t care man, this isn’t a damn popularity contest.  This is real world.  Grab hold and fight back or you’re gonna get ran over.

I was relieved of any dish pit shifts as my skill as a cook was more important.  Having mastered the prep room I was brought to the line.  The first station for me to learn was a utility station that used two fryers and an overhead broiler.  It was mostly an appetizer station but also prepared a few entrees.  We were breading our own chicken tenders, beer battering some mushrooms and frying the hell out of mozzarella sticks.  There were nachos,  a quesadilla/burrito hybrid and a few more items.  This was not easy.  I might’ve forced a prep cook out of myself but this was my first time on the line, save that concession stand at the pool.  And this was not time to throw ice into the fryer.

It took some time and hella patience from my coworkers, but I came to hold my own.  I got to to the point that I could do my assigned job but then also pay attention to those around me.  I was standing next to the salad station; I could help the person stationed here as needed.  My other side was a station that was basically an extension on the fry area.  The fryers were “back” and then there was “front”…food a little more intricate and expensive, plus direct assistant to the coordinator, the one selling the tickets.  I opened my eyes, shut my mouth and left my ego in the car everyday.  Before long I was scheduled across the line, including the grill.

Not to make this journey seem short and sweet, this had taken about a fourteen months, including being sidelined for about three weeks from a nasty moped accident.  By the time I got to the grill I knew the entire menu, could set up the kitchen by myself and was trusted for my judgment and decisions.  But the grill was a beast on to itself.  This was a huge metal monster that used actual wood.  We had to split wood out back in the morning, start a fire and keep it burning for twelve hours.  Hot spots, cold spots, keeping wood in the grill…managing the fire itself was intimidating.  Add on cooking chicken, salmon and the catch of the day, ribs, burgers, ribeyes, filets, strips and being in charge of the prime rib…this station was killer.  It also came with the highest pay and  most respect.  Although I would leave the ego behind, it would sneak in with me every now and then.

I would learn to grill and leave each night covered in grease and with holes burned into my clothes.  My hands looked like that of a mechanic and my hair smelled of smoke.  At one point I looked at my boss, the same man that interviewed me but now considered me his navigator on road trips, and said “I might have to go back to school” as I didn’t think I would ever master this new station.  But I kept on, kept showing up and kept pushing through each shift.  By this time it wasn’t my sister’s good standing that was keeping me employed, it was the performances and ethic that I have shown in my time here.  I was given grace on the grill, and yes by god, I finally got it.

There was much more to learn than just the stations.  Acceptance and people skills. How to train other new comers.  How to treat others according to them as individuals, not just with a blanket regiment.  These lessons would come over years and years and still continue to this day.  Plus I had signed up for this gig to quite literally “get my shit together.”  I didn’t have a crystal ball to unveil there was management on the horizon.  I also, unfortunately, allowed myself to fall into a certain comfort level where I would indulge in behavior that got me here in the first place.

At this time I took this job, I was desperately holding on to my teen years.  As I traveled briefly with this company and found myself from state to state, I hopped jobs a few times. As my sister had gotten me my first restaurant job, I always ended up finding employment where I had a connection somehow.  Be it my dad, a current employee, a next door neighbor…I would always find a job where I already had an “in” of some sorts.  It wasn’t til I was nearly forty-six years old and close to thirty years deep in the industry before I went out and got a job solely on my own merit.  But that’s a whole ‘nother story.