Someone Else's Ivy
It turned out that the CEO did not think the entire staff of one of his three cafés quitting en masse, and not attempting to train anyone new, was a laughing matter. He called me that afternoon, and not a chuckle escaped down the phone line. He offered to meet with us the next time he was in town. When I told the kids about this offer, they unanimously agreed that they were still going to quit, but that they would come back after that to talk with the CEO in the interest of improving an organization they once cared about and the conditions of future workers at our café and everywhere. The CEO did not, in the end, take them up on their offer. I told them he was running scared. I told them that without doing anything rash or dramatic, without screaming or throwing a punch, they, a group of ill-educated, under-appreciated, minimum-wage teenagers, had scared the shit out of a CEO. And, I told them, Susan was never going to forget us. We worked out our two weeks and then left.
Somewhere in those two weeks, I received the best thing the service industry ever gave to me. I received my favorite letter written to someone (me) who is in the habit of writing angry letters.
Dear Amy,
While we’re writing all these letters about the café, I thought I would write one to you.
When I came to work here I was too intimidated by everything to appreciate the people here. I was too jumpy and stressed to work well. Just this week I’ve finally figured out how to close the store and actually get out on time (even early!). Now that we’re leaving I’m going to miss this place. And I’m going to miss you.
We’ve both watched me go from a nervous wreck that over-achieved to a toned-down, underachieving but much more confident, fun and happy mess of a senior in high school. A lot has changed for me this year. You and the café have been a part of my growth. In some ways, this stuff happening at the store feels like one more piece of my life totally turning upside down. As much as I was failing school before, it was really this past week that I realized if things don’t change pace soon I may not graduate with my class.
I don’t even know much about you but I know you’ve meant a lot to me this year. I liked working with you even when we were both pretty grumpy. You made me laugh and you made me feel better about the world and you gave me good advice about my life. I’m really scared right now, more scared than I’ve been in a long time. It was nice to talk to you tonight and it has been nice to always have you care, and to have you be there.
So thanks for being a cool manager and for giving good advice. But most of all, thanks for believing in me.
Amanda
On our very last day, Susan called the store and told me that it was okay for me to leave, because I could get a different job. But, she said, it was irresponsible of me to encourage those kids to walk off because they didn’t have any skills and this had been a good position for them, and they probably couldn’t hope for better. She told me I was ruining their lives.
The other day, I was in my neighborhood bar, and James dropped a spoon. I yelled out, “You’re fired!” He has worked there for a long time, and he is good at his job, and it seems to me that the regulars and the bosses all love him. He is now a bartender. I heard that Deion received his GED and spent time traveling in Ireland; Kat got into University of Colorado for photography; Clarissa got a job working in an art gallery; Andrew moved to New York City to become a bike messenger and take classes at NYU. And I know for a fact that Amanda graduated high school on time and now attends college at my alma mater. As for me, I keep in touch with a few of them. After the coffee shop gig, I was a terrible secretary for a year and a half at a non-profit where I met my husband, and then I moved on to the job I didn’t know I was training for at the coffee shop: I became an assistant professor of English composition at a small liberal arts college, where I still occasionally hiss vocabulary words at young people.
This is a work of creative non-fiction. All of the events described happened, and I have recreated them as well as my memory allows. The letters are reproduced verbatim from the originals. I have changed the names of most people to protect their privacy, and the name and identifying details of the establishment at which we worked to avoid potential legal complications.
