Hey there from Austin, Texas! I have been missing out on my posts for over a month, when I promised myself I would do this at least once a week. The reason for all this lack of content is my move to Austin, Texas. After leaving Chicago, at the end of October, I had to adapt to this new city and try to get a job. A regular job, because a writing job is still up in the air.
Upon arrival, my dear friend referred me to work at her company. I was ok going back to the front of the house, hospitality industry, as my writing career is still in the pre-conceived stages, meaning, I write, I post and I apply for jobs. But I’m still in the recent graduate phased and my school, besides posting multiple job positions everyday, which are all located in different states, cities or are somewhere farther than I would like to travel. I have notifications on Facebook and I constantly receive updates about jobs in Florida, Maryland, LA, New York. The one close to me, for Whole Foods marketing position, was already filled.
I got the job and I went on my training, for the millionth time, the same speech of “Don’t harass people, don’t make fun of their accent, don’t be late”. Heck, I could be the one giving that training. The next day I arrived early and due to my experience I was immediately thrown into the line to cut avocados, set up the line for lunch and make tortillas. That’s when my brain crashed. If I’m working on something other than my career of choice, I can’t have time to think. I have to be moving non stop. If I stop and start making assumption my brain quits.
After making tortillas batter, weighing the tortilla batter and transforming them into 300 little balls, with my skinny arms, I had to clean the line before we left. All of that its definitely not a big deal, as long as it is in the job description. It wasn’t, it was completely different.
While bonding to the girl who was training me, I told her I had a writing degree and she asked me what I was doing on this job. “I need the money,” I answered. As I was cutting the avocados to make guacamole, I told her that I went to culinary school for a year, so I have knife skills, also food handling certificates from all the previous jobs. That’s when she looked at me and her face changed. “You have all these little secrets, that you keep spilling for me.” I should have told her that I had a food and beverage training in Australia and was also a F&B supervisor back in my home country.
It’s not actually secrets, I just learn to be quiet and keep it to myself, so I don’t have people changing their attitude like she just did. It’s ok to work with different things while you are starting out on your new career, I’m not ashamed of that, it is a job and I need to work. At the end of the day, I realized I’m not going to work with food anymore.
On that day, I decided to try something new, to be honest was a disappointment at first. This week I received a few phone calls and set up an interview for Tuesday, it is not a writing position yet, due to my experience she will keep me close, but not in charge of anything yet. I’m happy just to have a chance to learn.
After that, I wrote a few articles that I should post soon on Medium.com, about this work experience and a dinner I had with chiropractor who was selling his business, that shook my core. It still needs some editing, but it is off to a good start. A few days ago, I started to work on a kids series, the project has been a long time in the making. I started to do some of the illustrations, watching some drawing classes on SkillShare.
Next week I will tell you about what happened to both of my internships.
