thank God it wasn’t paintball!

if i ever move to a new town, i shall take a job with caribou coffee.  within a month, i’m sure i’ll have some friends.  it’s like creating your own facebook profile and friends list from scratch.  also, the pay is pretty darn good, especially when you add in tips (note to i.r.s. there are no tips) and why not starbucks?  oddly, it’s f2fb friend #256 melissa palka who gave me a good reason to not go with the seattle folks.

starbucks was named for the first mate in herman melville's novel moby dick

melissa explained that the rules at starbucks are a bit more rigid than at caribou.  for instance, a starbucks barista is expected to spend no more than thirty seconds interacting with a customer while still trying to establish a personal relationship that will make the customer feel loyalty.  thirty seconds feels like 140 characters–you need more than that.  melissa and i went to lazer quest to work off some caffeine jitters.

when i first separated from my husband, i tried really hard to make time with my sons be special.  it was a guilty parent move.  joseph would fire off all his rounds within the first thirty seconds and retire the field.  younger brother eastman would be quite aggressive but he had a backup that he wasn’t aware of–me–and so he took risks he shouldn’t have.

melissa is a wonderful gal but i think she had cased the joint before we started.  final score:  melissa 121 and me?  a negative 28.  and i fired several rounds into an employee who wasn’t too keen about it. the title of this post says it all.

later, melissa and i had a drink and talked about her ambitions.  she is in line to become a shift manager.  and from there, who knows.  caribou has a lot of room for ambitious baristas.

i drove home feeling pretty good despite the bruising score.  so i was surprised when i woke up the next morning with a case of “don’t go out of the house”. . . an anxiety attack that strangled me all day.  two ativan didn’t make a dent in it.  a hot shower provided no relief.  i watched several episodes of glee and that didn’t do anything.  i listened to a meditation tape.  i tried to walk to the workout room.  but i turned around after a block.  i was just too scared.

and it weirded me out because i kept thinking “i’ve been around the world!”  somehow i thought i had fundamentally changed.  it felt like defeat that i hadn’t.  later in the day, i forced myself out the door.  i walked towards the grocery store and on the way met jo caylor who is yes a f2fb friend but also someone from the neighborhood.  she asked me why i was shaking so much.  i started to talk, was pretty much incoherent.  she did what anybody should do to me when they see me like this.  she gave me a hug.

jo knows someone who is just like me, who gets out of the house even less than i did before i started this project.  i asked her what made this person so afraid.  and jo said “something bad always happens to her when she leaves the house, or at least, that’s what she thinks.”

maybe that’s what i was thinking yesterday.  maybe i just couldn’t think of what the bad thing was.

after seeing jo and walking around for a bit, i went to caribou and said hi to melissa!