Ep. 28: I Am Resident

In recent work news, we've somehow survived The Casserole Apocalypse of 2017, in which All-Star and a vengeful coworker together turned a slightly-dry pasta-based casserole into the End of Days...

Overshare has been seated at an all-male table this month, because apparently his creepy antics have been extended not only to staff but to his fellow residents...

Sir Talksalot has made unrest his prime goal at every breakfast...from heckling the sausage links to screaming about waiting 40 seconds for me to rush to his aide in a "Vitamin Emergency"...

I tried unwisely to "fix" a client complaint by explaining how I don't read minds and must be told there's a problem...I shouldn't have to overhear it...and that circular conversation left me so frustrated I practically threw Sweet and Low packets at Sugarfree when she requested them. Clearly my unchecked work-related emotions are beginning to interfere with my job performance...

To top it off, I had the GREAT PLEASURE of serving former resident Mr. Placemats at our free community breakfast last Friday. "Honey," he called me in that slurred, drunk-sounding voice of his, eyes glazed over like a hungry seagull stalking a piece of wonderbread. Ick and double ick.

Then my "dream menu" got about 25% finished before I stopped operating in denial and faced the fact that it's never gonna happen...because no matter what we do our residents will never be content...

I hear them ranting about the election and politics...and then confessing that they didn't bother voting. So why do you get to complain, I wonder?

I hear them complaining about cold oatmeal. If you leave it sit while you yak, and then pour cream all over it, it's bound to get cold. If you want it reheated, tell me. But if you make no move to change things, you should not get to complain!!

And that's when I realize...that I'm just like our residents in this respect. I Am Resident. Here I am, complaining about having to serve these people, but making no effort to change the situation.

The dream menu will never happen.
And even if it did, people would still find something to rant about.

So maybe the solution is that I need to not work there anymore. Or I need to work there less...

"If you always do what you've always done, then you'll always get what  you've always got."

Time to break the cycle?

Time to formulate an escape...

--

People are people, no matter their age. Some will be kind, curious, rude, condescending, bitter, or funny, and so on. I’m an “old people chef,” and this is my journal.

Ep. 27: Overshare

She stops by to pour him coffee, and one thick hand instantly finds the small of her back. She wriggles away and moves to another table.

At breakfast, the server clearing dishes finds his hand cupped around her bicep, caressing it as he asks her how she manages to stay warm in short sleeves. She yanks her arm free and scurries away.

At Halloween, workers dressed as hippies or witches or cats. He eyeballs one costumed lady and tells her, "well, you look sexy."
 


Getting the picture? This guy has no idea where the line is...that, or he doesn't care where it is and intentionally crosses it.


I was on my break the other day, hiding in a corner of the coffee shop, considering myself safe, when he wheeled his way in and said hello. I figured we'd each say a few words and he'd leave. But no. He stayed for 40 minutes. At one point during that time, he thought it would be funny to leap from a discussion of his children into a sex joke involving him and his late wife. And I didn't know it was a joke at first, so I was extremely uncomfortable and hurried to change the subject.

Still. Joke or no joke, talking sex with a stranger and one of the opposite sex is just awkward, especially when there is a client-employee dynamic at play.

This is why I am dubbing him Overshare. Sir Overshare? Mr. Overshare? Oversharington the Third? Anyway...

Crossing. The. Line.

He's still pretty new at the facility, so most of this information is just starting to travel. The combined stories make for one creepy picture. And I wonder what is next and when we're all going to start drawing that line for him, since he can't apparently find it on his own.

--
People are people, no matter their age. Some will be kind, curious, rude, condescending, bitter, or funny, and so on. I’m an “old people chef,” and this is my journal.

Ep. 26: Crankster Gangster

Sometimes ordinary people suddenly become characters. You've seen them day after day, heard their words and noticed their mannerisms, not really thinking anything unusual, until suddenly they morph. They suddenly are in costume according to their character, and what was frightening or boring or 2-dimensional before is suddenly rife with comedy and interest.

Crankster is one of those people. For the longest time, she was this cranky woman, barking about butter and toast and the size of the juice glasses. Then one morning, the steam rising from her cup of coffee became the haze of smoke in a 1920s speakeasy. She was leaned back in her chair, that glass of orange juice now a snifter of brandy in one hand, swirling slowly as she skeptically appraised the people and objects in the room. A smoldering cigar rested lightly on the fingers of her other hand, and she kept switching back and forth from cigar to brandy to cigar. Pinstripes and a jaunty hat completed her ensemble, and with each hoarse laugh, the stripes moved along her rolls and curves. She was no longer an old, cranky lady whose piercing gaze I avoid. Crankster was now a gangster, the head of some streetwise group of organized criminals. What was fear in me now turns to intrigue.

How did she come to be the haughty-eyed, gin-swilling, heard-hearted, pin-stripe-swagging creature that sits before us today? Surely at some time in life she was an innocent child, playing in the mud, curly blond hair bouncing as she beat her friends in softball again. Now that victory and that glory and that innocence survive only in the unconvincing laugh and the swirl of swill in her glass.

The eyes tell another story.

I've stopped asking who Crankster is, and I ask instead who she has been.

And now I not only fail to fear her. I couldn't even if I wanted.

Ep. 25: White Christmas

One morning last week, as I walked back and forth between the kitchen and the breakfast bar, Mr. Kindly said hello and asked me a question.
"Emily, do you have a copy of White Christmas?"
"Umm...like a recording?"
"No, the sheet music. Look in my cart over there."

There, in the drawer of his walker, was a faded paper copy of White Christmas. Copyright 1942. Freshly printed in the middle of WWII. Irving Berlin plinked it out himself. Bing Crosby made it famous. Mr. Kindly bought a copy and wrote his name in neat, swirling cursive across the front. He used to play piano himself before arthritis and stiff fingers. Now he was gifting me his own copy.

A "thank you" didn't seem like quite enough. "I'll have to play it for you sometime."
"I would like that," he smiled. Perhaps he was thinking of all the times he's played it himself. Memories of snowfall and kids at home and playing Santa Claus. And how he's giving away a piece of that. He is called Mr. Kindly for good reason.

Just before Bingo that day, I went out in the lobby and played through the song on the baby grand that sits there. Mr. Kindly came wandering in, so I played one more time while he sang quietly nearby.

It was a sweet moment, an oasis in what has been a rough year.

And I think, how I want to be like Mr. Kindly when I grow up.

Ep. 24: Buttered Toast

People are people, no matter their age. Some will be kind, curious, rude, condescending, bitter, or funny, and so on. I’m an “old people chef,” and this is my journal.
--
 
There's a golden moment here and there. I push open the dining room doors at 7 and say a "good morning" to the residents who've been waiting right outside for breakfast. I scoop up plates of scrambled eggs and sausage links and toast and place them in front of the early bird residents.

One of them finishes quickly and speeds away, mouth clenched tightly shut as she urges her Hoverround out of the dining room at the speed of light. It was Crankster, the one who bullied Elf last month about being "a moron." I swing by the table to clear her dishes and prepare for the next person.

"She has no patience, that one," says one man from her table.

"Yeah," says Sir Talksalot, sipping on his third giant glass of orange juice, "she was pretty peeved that you didn't butter her toast."

"Well, I only butter toast for people who can't butter it themselves," I say, beginning to fume inwardly about spoiled people. I figure if you have laundry, food, and cleaning all done for you, there's not much left to exercise, and what you exercise (buttoning clothes, buttering toast, dialing the phone) should be left for you to do. Use it or lose it.

Mr. Gentleman had a comment to add as he passed by the table: "Hey, I don't suppose you could put some sugar in my coffee for me?"

"Sugar?" I replied, confused for a moment until I saw the sarcastic expression on his face. I laughed. I threw my head back and laughed. He was making a joke about Crankster being ticked off at having to butter her own toast.

"Mr. Gentleman," I smiled, "you don't need any sugar in there. You are already sweet enough."

He just smiled back and shuffled away with his coffee, shaking his head in amusement at all the crazies in the world.

And that's one of those moments when work is ok. There are kind, funny people in the world. I can stop searching Indeed for remote work. I can stop planning a wilderness cabin for escaping the people and the endless dishes and food. Someone understands. And that changes everything.

Ep. 23: Elf's Advisory Committee

People are people, no matter their age. Some will be kind, curious, rude, condescending, bitter, or funny, and so on. I’m an “old people chef,” and this is my journal.
--

Plates are stacked. The steamtable holds buttered vegetables and rice and slabs of fish. The constant whir of the oven and the overhead fans mingles with banter on the radio. That's when the phone rings.

"Kitchen, Emily speaking."
"Emily!" excitement radiates from the voice on the other end. It's one of the residents, who I'll call Elf (like the movie). She's 50-something, but because of some developmental issue has remained about seven years old in her heart and mind.
"Hi, Elf," I reply, a grin growing on my face as I wait for a flood of questions, a whimsical change of mind, or an attack of joyous gusto. I am met with all three.
"It's mahi mahi today, Emily."
"Yes it is."
"I love mahi mahi. Do you love mahi mahi?"
"Yeah, it's pretty good."
"Well, I'm excited, Emily. You guys make the best mahi mahi. My sister makes it, too...last time I was at her house..."

And five minutes later, still smiling, I hang up the phone. What a refreshing change from bitter and cranky and demanding.

Unfortunately, even Elf is not immune to the bitter judgment of the people we serve.

Here's how it was told to me.

It was about a week ago at supper. She was seated with a stellar team:
Crankster, a bitter impatient resident who becomes incensed at the drop of a pin.
All-Star, the self-appointed chairperson of all things that are and are not her business.
Crafty, a manipulative and spoiled person who loves to stir the pot.

So there's Elf, eating an enchilada, raving about its gloriousness, asking questions and sharing stories like any happy seven-year old might do. She doesn't read the condescension on All-Star's face or the sheer hatred and rage of Crankster at being seated with her. Crafty no doubt is beginning to circle, like a vulture patiently waiting for a carcass.

Then she asks for seconds of the glorious enchilada, and that's when the hyenas pounce. She's raving again about this cheese enchilada when Crankster loses what little patience she had with her.
"Shut up. Just shut up. You are an idiot. You are a slow moron and you should not be living here with us," she declares to the seven-year-old heart of the woman next to her.

I wish I'd been there to tell Crankster to go to her room and think about what she's done and to look Elf in the eyes and tell her that none of that is true and don't believe it. It's like a kindergarten class in there.

But the hatefulness didn't end with Crankster's declaration of spite. No. It was just getting started. All-Star decided it was her place to advise Elf on her dieting choice (eating two enchiladas! oh no!!) and Crafty assisted. They followed her back to her room and lectured her at her apartment door for a while before trying to wedge their way in the door after her to continue their advisory committee on her life choices.

It's like we need lunchroom monitors and hall monitors to make sure residents are respecting each other's choices, privacy, and safety. The way they do in elementary schools and high schools.

Elf was completely destroyed. She hid in her room for the next week. Our administrator approved her for room trays at all meals, no charge, so she could avoid the bullies at her table. And then I believe Administrator had each bully into her office (the Principal's Office) to discuss their completely inappropriate behavior.

I wish they could get detention or get charged for verbal assault or be required to do community service. Something.

Elf's back in the dining room this month, now that we're on a new seating chart. She's placed at a table with Mr. and Mrs. Claus. They are so gracious and twinkly-eyed, so good natured and patient. They'll be sweet to her.

I saw her a couple days ago in the hallway before lunch.
"Emily!!" she called. "I'm so happy I can come down to dinner now." As in, so happy she can go without worrying about getting attacked.

"And look at this treeee!!" she exclaimed, gesturing to one of the ten or twenty glittery pines in the building. Her voice held so much reverence, like she'd never seen a Christmas tree before. "Wooow," she murmured, eyes wide, studying the lights and poinsettias, seeming to forget last week's hurts.

Ep. 22: Escape

People are people, no matter their age. Some will be kind, curious, rude, condescending, bitter, or funny, and so on. I’m an “old people chef,” and this is my journal.
--

Recycling
About midmorning,
amid smells of coffee and egg bake
and fried ham and steaming orange muffins,

I gather up the recycling
and head for the door,
a momentary escape:

In summer
I swim through suffocating humidity,
carboard in one hand,
imaginary snorkel in the other,
cottonwood leaves in the grove glimmering.

In fall
the crisp breeze carries
the tang of burning leaves
and thoughts of hay bales and hot cider.

Now, today,
the first snow swirls around me
as I walk
and watch
the scenery coated in white.

Pine and cinnamon and red ribbon
eclipse thoughts of dreary frozen smudged January ahead.

For now it is November and holidays are near.
Winter is here.

(copyright EA Schueller)

Ep. 21: Gourmet

People are people, no matter their age. Some will be kind, curious, rude, condescending, bitter, or funny, and so on. I’m an “old people chef,” and this is my journal.
--

"Gourmet" is the name I've given one of our residents. She's a very particular person, commenting on the thickness of noodles we use in a dish or how there wasn't quite enough crisp on her apple crisp. This gourmet attitude doesn't stop with her. It's also a habit of mind for most of the people we serve.

Manager and I were discussing this one day. I recalled working at a bar and grill and all the labor and staff involved in one dish or one order leaving the kitchen steaming hot and made to order and just to the customer's specifications. That is the sort of experience our residents seem to expect. What they don't think about is the fact that a bar and grill gets about $20-$30 per person per meal they serve. So I asked Manager, "what is our budget per plate?"

Here's what she told me: It's $5 per person.

Per meal?

No.

Per day.

We feed each resident a breakfast buffet, a noon meal, an afternoon snack, and a supper meal on five dollars.

If this was my personal food budget, we'd be eating mostly ramen noodles at home.

In the meantime, our residents get turkey and mashed potatoes, prime rib, spaghetti and meatsauce, tator tot hotdish, salmon patty on a bun with remoulade sauce, lamb with mint jelly...and an uncountable horde of cookies, bars, and bowls of fruit.

Yes, we buy in bulk. Yes, we have a contract with a food supplier. Both of these things cut the cost of what we do. However, five dollars a day per person just plain blows my mind.

In light of how we manage to feed these people well on such a tight budget, I'm thinking we must be magicians of some kind.

But then I return to work:
...Someone whistles me over to her table. The way you would whistle a reckless puppy away from traffic...
...A coworker swings by to chortle with me about a complaint he overheard: that the kitchen's plating technique leaves much to be desired...
...And I see a resident, Gourmet herself, pulling her rice krispy bar apart with a face of disgust. "There's too much goo in this."

These moments seem even more ridiculous when seen in the light of our budget. There's hardly room for meat and potatoes in there, much less the expectation of something Gourmet.

Ep. 20: Hotdog Trumps Ham

People are people, no matter their age. Some will be kind, curious, rude, condescending, bitter, or funny, and so on. I’m an “old people chef,” and this is my journal.
--

 

"I cannot have cake, I am a diabetic," says Sugarfree, lecturing me yet again about her diabetes that only shows its face when it is convenient for her. She'll eat pie, she'll eat brownies, she'll eat seven layer bars - but for some reason if you put cake in front of her, she suddenly remembers that she is a diabetic. This is why her somewhat sarcastic name given here is "Sugarfree."

Today Sugarfree informed us that she also wants to be "Ham Free."
This is because of tonight's supper:
Cranberry Glazed Ham

Yellow Rice

Steamed Baby Carrots

Cinnamon Baked Apples

Her response to this menu was, "I don't want rice. And I can't have ham. It's too salty. It makes me swell up like a balloon. I'd like to have a hotdog instead, with a side of carrots."

First, I've been working there over a year and the aide tonight has been working there for about six years, and neither of us has ever heard a complaint from Sugarfree about ham.

Second, a hotdog is not exactly a low-salt substitute for ham. It's like replacing salty pork with salty mystery meat.

Third, she was trying to order an alternative a whole hour after the cut-off. She knows better than that. I smell manipulation afoot!

For all these reasons, we told her no. She then asked to have a plateful of carrots since neither ham nor rice sounded good to her.

A half hour after that, she informed us that she would not be coming to supper after all.

She was going out to eat.
Out to the local Asian restaurant.
Because that couldn't possibly be salty.

The lack of logic here is amazing.

"I can't have salt, so I'd like to have a hot dog.
On second thought, I think I'll go have a pile of MSG."

Tell me about your special diet again, please?

Episode 19: Two Cents Times a Million

People are people, no matter their age. Some will be kind, curious, rude, condescending, bitter, or funny, and so on. I’m an “old people chef,” and this is my journal.
--

 

Every resident has an opinion to share, whether you ask for it or not.
Here’s a collection of real complaints we have received. Many of them contradict each other, as each person has a different definition of “good food.”

Most of them make us laugh. We can’t please everyone.

“
I wish the oatmeal bowls were smaller.

I only wanted half a grilled cheese!

This soup is way too hot.
This soup is lukewarm.

I’ve had so much scrambled eggs I’m afraid I’ll grow feathers!
I prefer hard boiled eggs.
(On sausage gravy and biscuit day) I prefer scrambled eggs.

These desserts are too big.

I wish you’d used a bigger noodle.
These noodles are too soft.
The noodles are too chewy – look at how everyone is chewing and chewing!

We want more meat and potatoes.
We’d rather have potatoes than rice or pasta.
We have too many mashed potatoes.

The kraut soup is too salty.
The kraut soup is not sour enough.

I really love these chicken strips.
Chicken strips are not an acceptable entrée.

These eggs are not fit.

”

Episode 18: Crafty's Salad

People are people, no matter their age. Some will be kind, curious, rude, condescending, bitter, or funny, and so on. I’m an “old people chef,” and this is my journal.
--

 

A certain resident was pressing on the boundaries of sanity this last weekend. This person can go by no other name than Crafty. She is continually working out how to manipulate things to her own purposes.

It should not have surprised me when a couple resident assistants approached me at 9:15 and said that Crafty had just called to change her lunch order. I explained about the deadline (9:00), and we all agreed that Crafty had called them because she hoped they wouldn't know about the deadline.

Then about 11 a.m., she showed up with a new list of alternatives for the week, including the change she had attempted at 9:15. It was still too late, and I just shook my head at her further clumsy attempt at gaining exception where no other resident could.

She had requested her meal sent to her room, so at noon the tray with her salad went up. About ten minutes later, I had the delight of receiving a phone call from her.

"When I talked to you earlier, you said I could have a hot dog," her indignant words bit through the receiver.
"You did not talk to me. You spoke with the gals on the floor."
"Well, they told me I could have it." Her indignation was growing, and the grating scrape of her voice rising in volume.
"Then they were mistaken. And you know that the deadline is 9:00. You had ordered a salad and so that's what we sent."
"Well," she screeched, "I WON'T EAT IT!"
As if it was going to really bother me. We all know she has piles of junk food in her apartment.
"I'm very sorry," I stated, and hung up before she could continue.

Later she accused the RAs of not supplying her daily pain pills - as in, she wanted double pain meds.
Then she screamed at someone in her room that she had never received her noon meal - even as it was visible on its tray across the room on her countertop.

Crafty was on a roll.

Now today she left a note asking to please be moved from Table 1 to Table 9. We change seating monthly and we do not change seats unless there is serious conflict between two residents at a particular table (which has happened maybe three times in the last year). I tore up the note as I've torn many others. It was a surprise to see that she didn't swap her place card with one at her desired table. That has happened many times before.

The fact that these things are even issues boggles me. Screaming at someone about a salad. Bold faced lying about a salad. Acting like deadlines apply to the other 69 people in the building and not to you.

Over a salad.

If it wasn't real, it'd be sheer comedy.

Episode 17: The Dragon Smiles

People are people, no matter their age. Some will be kind, curious, rude, condescending, bitter, or funny, and so on. I’m an “old people chef,” and this is my journal.
--

We ran out of water goblets for noon dining set-up again today, so I ventured over to Special Cares (aka The Dragon's Lair) to see about borrowing a few from them.

Dragon Lady was there, strangely calm. She greeted me by name, so I greeted her by name. I thought I'd better mention why I was there, so I explained and then braced for impact.

Instead of a roar and a pounce, she merely told me that I could certainly take several goblets, since they don't need that many in their community anyway. "In other words, help yourself," she concluded. And then she smiled. The smile was not followed with a mocking laugh or a derisive comment. A smile. On the corners of the mouth of the dragon.

Wonders never cease.

Episode 16: For Better or Worse

for a preface, see my work stories home page.


There was a resident once, let's call her Jewel. She lived in the memory care unit, where she was continually trying to escape. She'd wait at the door, tap on the glass, her coke bottle glasses magnifying her gray eyes under a cloud of curly gray hair.

Most of the time she babbled incoherently or said nothing at all, floating through the unit like a shadow or a ghost. Once in a while she would suddenly take shape, however, and when this happened, she was one spunky woman. She has been reported saying things like, "You take the damn pills, then."

Then there came a man to visit. She recognized him instantly and stopped wandering. She wrapped her arms around him and held him, forgetting about the open door behind him, not needing to escape anymore.

He told me their story. Jewel had been his neighbor, living up the gravel road from him. He was a farmer, which means manual laborer plus businessperson plus gambler. He needed help with the books, so he asked the lovely, spunky Jewel if she would mind helping him with them, and she agreed. The rest is history.

"She wasn't really all that good of an accountant," he confessed. The sweet shy smile that played on his face told volumes. I instantly imagined him a younger single man, eating alone at the kitchen table, saying no hullos or goodbyes as he goes out to the field. Then along comes Jewel, and he's no longer alone in his big, old farmhouse. Jewel sits across from him at supper. Jewel's laughter fills the empty, echoing space. Jewel stands beside him when the market looks grim and the bills are piling up.

Now its him who fills the echoing spaces, who squeezes her hand and studies her vacant expression with that sweet, shy smile of his. Now he sits next to her though there's not many words and not much laughter.

"For better or worse," says the age-old vow.

This farmer and this accountant,
husband and wife,
are still living that vow.

For better or for worse
shows its best
in the worst.

Episode 15: The Last Text

for a preface, see my work stories home page.



I have only one protected message on my phone.

Dated November 30, 2015, 7:59 pm:
We work it out :-)

A former coworker (let's call her Sunny) and I were working on swapping shifts over the holidays, and that was her last message to me.

Rewind about four months from that message to when I was new at my current job, and you'd see that Sunny was driving me crazy. Sometimes she would instruct me on how to do an elementary task. Sometimes she would display complete disorganization, leaving everything until the last minute when it would magically come together. She'd be standing there, flushed and chipper. I'd be around the corner with all my hair torn out. I couldn't decide which I preferred - the laid back chaos of working with Sunny, or the tense machinery of working with Manager.

She started to grow on me, nonetheless (as did Manager). For one, Sunny had joined our work team a month before I did, and both of us had the common experience of being "hazed" by the fiery rage of our coworker Dragon Lady, who marks her territory on each new employee the way any animal does.

Then Sunny's teenage daughter Tuneful joined the team, and she was like a mini photocopy of her mom. Both were flustered and haphazard in their work-style but also full of ideas, random knowledge, mirth, and music. It was touching to see and hear how Sunny blissfully lavished love on her kids. Once, she came to drop off Tuneful for her shift, and before leaving she pulled her close so they were hugging cheek-to-cheek. "Love you," she smiled, speaking with intense purpose as if it were the last time. I think of that often now that she's gone.

Sunny loved her kids, but talk was her passion. She would talk about her estranged husband, talk about her boyfriend, talk about motor racing, talk about cooking, talk about her summer home in a trailer in the woods. She loved talk. She was an artist, and talk was her medium.

Sunny passed away sometime during the night after she sent me her cheerful text, November 31, 2015. Almost a year ago now. Turns out she had been spending the night in her truck (not at home, because she couldn't stand her husband). Tuneful found her the next day. She had died of a massive heart attack and no one had been there to witness it or call for help.

Her three kids are growing up without her. I can't imagine. Every time I clear the messages from my phone, Sunny's remains. I see her last text and remember her life, her spunk, her easy-going manner, and the way she loved her kids. It's a final message, and I'm still trying to understand why it had to be final.

"We work it out," she wrote to me, followed by a cheesy smiley face, so true to her sunny character.

And we're still here, still trying to work it out.

Episode 14: The Numbers

for a preface, see the home page of my work stories: Paradise (aka The Job)

How do we measure a day?
Here's how I measured a 13+ hour day this week:

8 quarts liquid egg
56 sausage patties
36 pounds of roasted chicken, half white, half dark
2 gallon tub of mashed potatoes
1 gallon gravy
12 pounds steamed vegetables
68 servings mixed fruit
80 pieces white frosted cake
1.5 gallons cinnamon ice cream
60 beef sandwiches
(3 with no cheese, 6 with ground meat, 1 with ground meat AND no cheese)
5 pounds of lettuce
2 quarts of diced tomato
2 bags of green beans for everyone that can't chew lettuce
70 slices of raspberry gelatin dream cake

68 residents eating breakfast, lunch, snack, and supper
2 tired legs
1 woman, grateful to be done for the day.

Episode 13: Musical Themes

for a preface, see the home page of my work stories: Paradise (aka The Job)


Picture the scene: an entryway flanked by tall white pillars, double doors opening to a wide ballistraded staircase, comfortable couches pulled up near a gleaming grand piano. The mysterious, mellow sounds of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata are floating through the air as a volunteer pianist gives it her best amateur tinkling of the keys. Someone yawns theatrically. Perhaps that's to be expected of elderly people in the boondocks of Minnesota trying to digest classical music. Then in the midst of a melody that calls up images of mist over a full moon, someone makes an announcement to her neighbor, and loudly. "I didn't come here for this kind of music."

Um, you're welcome?

Some people are always ungrateful. It's a lifestyle, nearly.

Episode 12: Purpose

for a preface, see the home page of my work stories: Paradise (aka The Job)

The Ownerless Mug

The dishwasher churns
the disposal growls
and a mist rises over stacks of dishes,
when there appears one of the ownerless mugs
returning from its new-found home,
its blue stripe grinning up at me.

I imagine it still covered in the fingerprints
of a lady whose children's names keep slipping out of her hands.
One thing she does know is the comfort of a warm cup of coffee
clasped in her wrinkled hands.

The ownerless mug is not without purpose.

It wears its blue stripe like a badge of office
as it shrugs away the memories of the cupboard corner
and proudly does what it was made to do.

"Wash me, send me out again," it smilingly pleads from the dishwashing rack.

This encourages my heart,
as the purpose or the destiny or the direction keeps slipping from my own hands.
All I know is some small comfort in letting it write itself,
whatever it may be.

Whatever I may be,
may yet be shaped and fired in Heaven's kiln
and painted with a blue stripe.

The aimless person is not without purpose.

Episode 11: Mr. Placemats Returns

for a preface, see the home page of my work stories: Paradise (aka The Job)

A few Saturdays ago, I finished a 13-hour shift, known in our kitchen as a "double shift." I drove my little rust-jeweled car to the liquor store and picked up a bottle of bubbly. I got home, set the wine to chill, and settled into pajamas in front of Skyrim and then Miss Fischer's Murder Mysteries.

Glass after glass of Cook's Brut (cheap bubbly), I raised a giddy good riddance toast to former resident Mr. Placemats, all his chauvinism, all his rudeness, all his loud insults, all his fake friendliness, all his antics, and especially to the fact that none of these would be the concern of our facility any more.

Ahem: quoth the raven, nevermore. (BTW: Blogger's spellcheck thinks "quoth" is spelled incorrectly. Think again, Blogger.)

My original plan had been to toast each individual antic and memory separately, but my calculations led me to believe this would end in a blood alcohol level of 99.9% and death (not necessarily in that order), so I chose to simply get good and buzzed on bubbly in general celebration of Mr. Placemat moving back to his house.

It wasn't until this past week that I, to my surprise, heard yet again his dreaded name uttered in our halls.

Turns out he's been seen in the coffee shop of our facility, sipping from our mugs and reading our paper, doubtless uninvited by any current resident. Next thing, he'll be trying to sneak into the breakfast buffet or to a noon meal. I left a note on the white board to the high schoolers, hoping they'll charge him for meals if he tries this on the weekend, as he doesn't live here anymore and therefore does not pay room or board.

Just when we thought we were free of the devil, he returns to repossess the halls that were sanctified upon his departure. Now we have to get the holy water out again...

Where's your "harem," you so brazenly bragged of organizing, Sir Placemats? Are they not making you coffee at home? AKA elsewhere?

I have the strangest sensation that this nightmare will be revisited. My fingers involuntarily are finishing this episode with the ominous phrase, "TO BE...CONTINUED."

Duhn duhn duhhhhhn!

Episode 10: TGIF

for a preface, see the home page of my work stories: Paradise (aka The Job)

The Double Shift:

thirteen hours of ache creep up from the hard floor into my legs
from the balls of my feet, through my arches
like ivy winding up my leg-trunks, round my knee caps and quads
anchoring me unwillingly to the ground

shuffling home on the stumps that once were my feet
sunlight winking through the archway of trees over our street
a pumpkin smiles at me from the front step

and next
my feet return, each with a separate pulse
and I'm jello,
taking on the shape of the couch,
de-coagulating, oozing into the cracks

only retaking human form to raise a toast

Happy Friday.

Episode 9: I Spy

for a preface, see the home page of my work stories: Paradise (aka The Job)

In the dining room, I spy some grungy little details:

super indelible lipstick stains on juice cup rims
a red "x" marking the only pan that doesn't heat-warp
a mop head on the floor to soak up a constant drip from the ceiling vent
a wedge of sheetrock missing from a doorway where the cart shaved it off
one burnt out bulb in the wall sconces
four clocks, all reading slightly different times
and a cupboard corner full of ownerless items:
   a black mug
   a white one with a blue stripe
   a squat, round vase
   a half-pint canning jar
   a floral-handled spoon
   a blue plastic cup.

This is not the rural Midwest of your homesteading blogs,
pristine white farmhouses and chickens and overalls.
This is where we are now.
Things are underfunded and worn out.
People are worn out and wearing out their complaints.

People with no place to be and no schedule to obey
asking sternly or frantically, mostly accusingly:
"Is my toast done yet?"