Friday 6 September 2013

A farewell to paws

I found myself in a strange situation today while making pasta at work. The pan we use to cook in is stained at the bottom quite badly, so much so that it has some weird texture at the bottom which is impossible to clean off. While I was cleaning out said pan I was reminded of an anecdote which I promptly told my co-worker about my first time cleaning it.

It was my trial shift, before I even had the job and I had never worked in a kitchen before so I wanted to make a strong first impression. I stuck to what I knew that day: washing up. When handed the pan I noticed the nasty bits and bobs stuck to the bottom which I naively thought I could clean. 5 solid minutes of scrubbing later, the pan had only improved slightly. Crushed and resigned I turned to the people I was trying to impress and shamefully said that I couldn't clean the pan. Their response was laughter. 'That old thing has never been so clean! Well done!'

What made telling this story so strange didn't occur to me until I had finished telling it - it was about my trial shift. I was telling a story about my first ever shift, with a sense of weary nostalgia, just one hour away from the end of my final day at Eddie Catz.

After saying my goodbyes and returning home I was hit by that familiar hollow feeling and I didn't feel like doing much at all except eat ice cream. It's just a little sad to think that after 18 months, I have finished there. Although I agreed to work there again over Christmas between term time, I couldn't help but feel sentimental over the small things. Things like, never using the coffee machine again, never get to clean the dishwasher or see the wonderful people again.

Sadness aside, I think this has opened up a lot of, what is essentially, free time that I can put to good use back into Cafe Studios. 

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