First of all, thanks to my dad, who when I let the cat out of the bag as to what I was up to, texted back with three words...girl with knives.
See, I hadn't told anyone what I was doing, except my husband and mom, but I was so excited that it may come to be that I couldn't control myself.
Let me start at the beginning...I love to cook, I mean REALLY love to cook. I have no training in the kitchen, other than being turned on to good food by Cooks Illustrated. I realized that by following tried and true recipes, I couldn't go wrong. Well, I think a cooking monster has been created.
I've gone to not handling raw meat about 10 years ago, to today...I'll touch anything food related, and with abandon.
Anyway, my husband bought a new sausage stuffer and just HAD to use it two weekends ago, so off we went to our local butcher for some back fat, 5 pounds of it. As we left, I said to him "I think I want to work there for free a couple of hours a week". Well, when I decide I want to do something, you'd better hold me back because I'm like a steam roller!
After discussing it, and getting more excited by the days, I took myself down there, ordered my Easter ham and put my big girl pants on and asked if they would let me intern/work for free a few hours a week. Turns out, no, I can't, due to liability, BUT they may have a possibility of a part time position. Holy shit! Was this too good to be true? Maybe, but we chatted for 15 minutes or so, he told me to send him a resume to placate his CPA and he'd be in touch.
Now, I'm going to be 40 years old this year, and I've never written a resume, ever. Never had to! This scared me the most, what do I put on there to make me look qualified to cut meat? Thank goodness for templates, I found one and got to work. Okay, that's done, now who the hell can I ask to be a reference? Well, that turned out to be easy, the three people I asked were absolutely thrilled.
I wrote up my cover letter, trying to make myself look as qualified as possible, and with shaking
hands, sent it off to never never land via email.
I spent the next 15 hours, hitting send/receive on my email relentlessly. I'm a little bit manic, actually. Well, lo and behold, he writes back "Can you come in Thursday at 3pm for a couple of hours for a hands on interview?"
Can I???? Is the pope Catholic? (I'm not religious, that's just a quote I love:))
I woke up at three o'clock that night and started the countdown....12 hours from now, I'll be in a butcher shop...four o'clock, still awake....11 hours. Noon....3 hours. Can you see I was excited? Crazy, maybe too.
Well, it was more than I expected, and different too. They actually let me touch meat! And use a knife! And use the cash register! And talk to customers! I truly thought I'd be washing dishes, which I did, mopping floors, didn't, and doing a lot of watching, no time for that.
I came home with my heart racing and 2 beautiful ribeye steaks for my effort, which were delicious! I couldn't stop talking once I got in the door, my husband is jealous, and a new part of my life may have begun. I don't know that I have a job, yet. But I'm sure I will. And I think I'll love it. And I never in a million years would have imagined my life would take this turn, but here we go...