My Mom's Job: "Here, Do This Thing That's Boring"

So, several weeks ago, I was recruited to go to my mom's job to work. OH, GANDRAYDA, WHY, WHY! My heart is broken now. Have you ever had something happen that you wished didn't happen, but there's no taking it back because it already happened? Then you read something that reminds you of that something and all the feelings come back in a horrible whirlwind tornado of sorrow? Oh, would to God that the memories of her would evaporate from my soul. And that I hadn't mentioned her in this blog post. Oh, that pink metamorph!



Anyways. I was recruited to go to my mom's job. They always work me like a slave. "Do this, do that, touch not, taste not, handle not," they bark. Well, this day it was special; it was kind of like preparing for a birthday party for 120 people. I think it's illegal to have 120 people at a birthday party.

Regardless, there I was. Me and my mom showed up at 9 AM. I was on my feet until 1 PM, then I got to sit down for half an hour (I played my guitar), and then I was back on my feet until 3:30 PM, when it was time for me and my mom to have a 15-minute "Everyone but us is stupid" break.

From 1:30 PM to 3 PM, I was given the privilege of getting the coffee additives ready. It went like this: wipe the tub out with a damp cloth. Get 8 fake sugar packets. Put those into the tub, next to those, put 10 creamer packets, and then 8 real sugar packets. Then put 10 straws. Repeat 24 times.

Then I got to wipe down the salt and the pepper shakers with the damp cloth. Each one was splattered with...something sticky. So they took a while to wipe down. Here is my finished work:

I hate coffee additives now. And I hate salt and I dislike pepper. The straws? They're OK.

Then (after the everyone-but-us-is-stupid break) I got to make salad. Let me rephrase that. I got to make salad for 125 people.

Oog. Luckily, I got a competent helper in the form of an 11-year-old. He added the bell pepper ring and the tomato to the top. He saved me about 5 minutes of time. He did good.


Just when I thought my troubles were over, and that I would get to go play my guitar some more, a younger waltzed in carrying some people. By people, I mean these:

Oog. The sight of them makes me SICK. So you know, 'younger' is a word I use for teenagers. "Youngers." I.e., I don't mean "someone younger than me," I mean "someone who is within this age group." Interchangeable with 'hipsters.'

So anyways, one of these hipsters waltz in with these people. I approached to render air. I mean, aid.

First, he did it all wrong. So with my direction, we were able to get a few up. Then his girlfriend materialized. That's when things got tricky. I tried to run it down to her- "touch not, taste not, handle not," but she wouldn't listen. "OOH, LET'S FOLD THESE IN HALF SO THAT WE'LL ONLY HAVE HALF AS MANY TO DO LOL!" she blurted. He thought that was a great idea. I thought that they deserved each other.

"Listen, stupid fool," I said. "If we fold them in half, we'll still have the same amount of wall to cover, but then we won't have enough people!"

They stared blankly, very nervously/frightened. "OK, look," I said. "People. There are fifteen of them. There are ten people worth of wall. If we only have seven people, then how will we cover the ten people worth of wall?"

After a few seconds, he raised his hand excitedly. "Well?" I asked. "There are three of us!" he said. Then he counted us to make sure. "Yeah! We can stand there and make up for the rest!" He smiled real big. "Well," I began. "We could do that, but no." "Why not?" he asked, providing a shockingly thousand-mile, open-mouthed stare, as if his brain had suddenly turned to mush.

I just looked at him. "Because, then we'll have to sit there- for hours- and unlike the people, we jut out from the wall two feet. People would throw coffee on us," I added, frustrated. "But wouldn't that help us stay awake?" she added hopefully. "In a sense, yes," I allowed. "Regardless, we are not going to fold them in half, and we're not going to sit here on the ground like idiots getting coffee thrown on us."


This went on for at least two hours. And putting the people up was just as frustrating- either they wouldn't stick, or they'd come out lopsided. When we thought we were done about 40 minutes into this ordeal, the news came that we had more to do. "They are young and reckless," I confided to Red. "They are not ready." I forget what she said, but it spurred me to say "OK, I'll go gather my charges, then." It must have been a pep talk of some kind. Why do I know so many more women than men?


I digress. Remember the 125 salads I made? Well, I had to do the same thing with a cake. Or rather, a lot of cakes. If you look at the picture with the salad, you can see the cake near to it. Except that there were many platters of cake on plates. It was kind of sad that all of this brave food was about to be slaughtered. I could hear them singing "Muffin Man" and "BINGO"...innocently.


Then it was time to serve the food. I was assigned to switch the pans out. So when they ran out of corn, it was my duty to get the pan of corn out of the oven and switch it out with the other pan. I had to scream "AHHHHHH! HOT PAN! OUT OF MY WAY OR I'M THROWING IT IN YOUR FACE! AHHH!" at the top of my lungs while moving the pans so that they would know I have a hot pan. It's hard to scream in such a harried way and not match that physically by jumping around or moving violently.


Then the ceremonies began and concluded. Then it was time to clean up. The work was finished at 10 PM. I was on my feet for roughly 13 hours. Three days later, I noted that the flesh at the ends of my toes were still numb. While I was volunteering, my dad at home made the lid for the guitar case. It rained on the way home. Problem is, as soon as we pulled into our property it stopped. The more I experience this, the more I believe that our land is actually cursed.