{"id":72,"date":"2022-01-01T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-01-01T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/catastrophicstardust.com\/?p=72"},"modified":"2022-01-03T14:56:15","modified_gmt":"2022-01-03T14:56:15","slug":"retail-story-first-job-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/catastrophicstardust.com\/?p=72","title":{"rendered":"Retail Story: First Job – Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Kill Them With Kindness: Stories of My Life in Retail<\/em><\/strong> is what I\u2019ve decided to name my retail story memoir book, if I actually ever finish writing it. Anyone who has ever worked in a customer service type roll, whether it\u2019s phones, fast food, or store retail, can relate the customer service stories that come across Facebook in a click bait article.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The story I\u2019d like to share today, took place at my first job. This is an exerpt from my rough draft I started last year\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m pretty sure no one really graduates high school thinking yes, I\u2019m going to flip burgers for the rest of my life. I mean, maybe someone does, if they really love burgers. Anyway, most kids start their working years in some sort of fast food. It\u2019s not straight up retail, but it is a form of customer service, and depending on your role, you may be dealing with the public in the form of a cashier or drive through worker.<\/p>

My story starts no different from many others. However, I didn\u2019t start out with a greasy fast-food chain with a drive through, so I have no stories of burns on my hands and arms, which many young kids seem to have from their first job. My first job was at a sandwich shop. Still fastish food, but no grease, and no order window to deal with. Just me, face to face with customers the whole time, with only a sneeze shield protecting me and the food from them. At sixteen years old, I started off making more than minimum wage, so I thought I was the shit at the time. A week after I was hired, another high schooler from a neighboring town was hired in (I\u2019ll call her J), so we learned the process together essentially. I also had 3 neighbors that worked there, one being a manager, and I had known them all my entire life, so it was a simple hire in process and a comfortable arrangement. Perfect for my anxiety ridden self.<\/p>

Now, I\u2019ve always had a bit of anxiety (it\u2019s gotten worse as the years have gone by), but nothing really prepares you for having the customers watch your every move as they custom create a sandwich. Those first few weeks were hell while I learned the methods, but eventually I was lightning fast, and my sandwiches looked good. Even over 20 years later, I will still criticize a sandwich if I see it\u2019s been made sloppily, and my husband has never had a sandwich look as good as mine did!<\/p>

Like I said though, food work is a bit different from regular retail work, but it is a decent introduction into that customer service life. You get the same scrutiny from customers, and you still have those high-pressure scenarios that test how you react. I\u2019ll never forget about a month into working there, the \u201cnight manager\u201d I\u2019ll call Cee, had been teaching me how to braid the bread to make the massive sandwiches that get ordered for parties. J and another long-time worker were there as well, and when the dinner rush hit, everyone was out on the main floor making sandwiches except Cee, who needed to get this party order finished up for the next day. We had a line of people out the door and the next thing I know, a flash of red goes everywhere! The longtime employee had sliced through his finger, right there in front of a full line of customers, and all over the food.<\/p>

Thinking back now, the smart thing to have done would have been to call an ambulance, because the worker did not have his own vehicle, and would not have been able to drive himself anyways. Instead, Cee decided he was going to take him to the hospital (this guy used any excuse he could to get out of work), and left us two high schoolers, who had only been employed for a month, to figure out what to do next. This is not something they covered in training.<\/p>

What stands out to me in all of this, is that we didn\u2019t lose a single customer. There must have been twenty-five people or more standing in line waiting for dinner, and they all witnessed blood spraying everywhere. Honestly, this is one of the more positive customer stories in my arsenal, because these people were sympathetic. They patiently waited while we pulled out every single bucket of cut veggies, bleached down all the surfaces, and brought in fresh buckets of toppings to refill. (Thankfully, we normally had an extra of each already cut up and covered in the huge walk-in fridge, so it was easy to grab when we were in a rush). It took us about twenty minutes to completely redo the front, and then me and her scrambled to get these customers on their way.<\/p>

I\u2019d like to think that my anxiety had secretly prepared me for a scenario like that. I remember being extremely calm, thinking through the steps we needed to do. I do recall, when we closed that night, uncontrollably shaking as the day\u2019s events caught up with me. Watching someone nearly cut their finger completely off and needing to clean up that crime scene certainly wasn\u2019t on my to-do list at 16!<\/p>Kill Them With Kindness<\/em><\/strong> (In Progress) – Holly D. Perkins – Cowgar <\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Looking back, I can\u2019t believe all the customers still bought food! I\u2019m not sure I\u2019d even trust my teenagers to be able to clean up a bodily fluid spill completely, and then prepare food there. I guess people were desperate not to cook dinner, just like all of those cars you see in a drive-thru wrapped around the building. They would rather sit in traffic for 30 minutes waiting on crap food than to go home and cook something. I get that though, as a parent now. Cooking is exhausting!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kill Them With Kindness: Stories of My Life in Retail is what I\u2019ve decided to name my retail story memoir book, if I actually ever finish writing it. Anyone who has ever worked in a customer service type roll, whether it\u2019s phones, fast food, or store retail, can relate the customer service stories that come…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":49,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,2],"tags":[55,51,53,54,52,3],"class_list":["post-72","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-kill-them-with-kindness","category-small-writings","tag-book-writing","tag-kill-them-with-kindness","tag-retail","tag-retail-stories","tag-short-story","tag-small-writings"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/catastrophicstardust.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/png_20211229_085309_00006955475954862351795.png?fit=3000%2C1125&ssl=1","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":125,"url":"https:\/\/catastrophicstardust.com\/?p=125","url_meta":{"origin":72,"position":0},"title":"“Stabitha” vs. “Karen”","date":"June 13, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Anyone working in retail has dealt with a difficult customer. I had a doozy of one the other day. My current retail job has me in a hardware store, so mixing paint is part of that job. A customer had stopped one of our OPE technicians at the paint counter\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Kill Them With Kindness"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/catastrophicstardust.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/png_20211229_085309_00006955475954862351795.png?fit=1200%2C450&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":16,"url":"https:\/\/catastrophicstardust.com\/?p=16","url_meta":{"origin":72,"position":1},"title":"Blog Intentions","date":"December 26, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"Oh look, another attempt at a blog. I\u2019ve had many starts and stops over the years with blogging. From cowgarfamilyadventures.blogspot.com, to palebluehomestead.blogspot.com, to palebluehomestead.com. I do plan to keep palebluehomestead.com active, even though it hasn\u2019t been in some time. Although homesteading is something we really won\u2019t be diving into (besides\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Small Writings"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":39,"url":"https:\/\/catastrophicstardust.com\/?p=39","url_meta":{"origin":72,"position":2},"title":"Writing Prompt Wednesday – 12\/28\/21","date":"December 29, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"Since this blog is my personal blog, I'll be sharing writings and ramblings off and on. One thing that I did for a little while was search Pinterest for writing prompts. That actually spawned a few characters that I've started developing into larger stories, and maybe one day I'll actually\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Small Writings"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/catastrophicstardust.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/20211227_174934_00004408643687099451709.png?fit=800%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":319,"url":"https:\/\/catastrophicstardust.com\/?p=319","url_meta":{"origin":72,"position":3},"title":"Goodbyes are Hard","date":"April 6, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"We had to say goodbye to one of our dogs this week. We knew the time was near. Apollo had been mentally declining for months. We knew when we went to West Virginia in March that it would be his last trip down. He was finding it more and more\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Homesteading"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/catastrophicstardust.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/screenshot_20230404_142704_instagram8215221476265479441.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1070,"url":"https:\/\/catastrophicstardust.com\/?p=1070","url_meta":{"origin":72,"position":4},"title":"2026… Bracing for Impact","date":"January 16, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"The world is a mess, and everyone is just trying to survive. That seemed to be 2025's theme, but it didn't start off that way. Logging back into this blog, I see 4 draft posts for 2024 that I never finished. They need photos and refinement. Maybe that'll happen this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Ramblings"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/catastrophicstardust.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/20211229_095421_00008393513576783207482.png?fit=1200%2C600&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":58,"url":"https:\/\/catastrophicstardust.com\/?p=58","url_meta":{"origin":72,"position":5},"title":"Talk Therapy Thursday – Pandemic Thoughts","date":"December 30, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"These types of posts I\u2019m hoping to use as a kind of therapy. A safe space to just unload my thoughts, fears, feelings, and strategies. 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