Travis and Heather's shower curtain

 I had tried to hang on for a few more weeks working at the restaurant but finally I decided to give my notice, after many months of deliberation. So I was finishing out my two weeks working pastry on the day that another restaurant (some friends of ours) were in for their staff party. I had to put out 50 of the same dessert, very simple, no rush. Somehow, SOME-HOW! I started plating them with the wrong icecream and by the time the chef and I had noticed half of them were already at the tables. He just looked at me like he was completely disgusted, “what the fuck are you doing?” he said.

“I don’t know! I don’t know what I’m doing! I don’t know what to do, should I just keep sending them out with vanilla or should I switch now, half way through to creme fraiche!!!?” I cried.

He just walked away and left me there holding the icecream scoop, I just crumbled and actually started to cry. The dessert, the end to a 6 coarse meal for the party of 50 restaurant staff upstairs still needed to go out so I kept plating and crying. I decided that since the last 20 were a separate table that I would take that opportunity to switch to creme fraiche. Meanwhile, the group upstairs was pretty drunk and a few of the cooks from the party had stumbled down to the kitchen to chat before dessert, including a very talented but notoriously “tough”(to put it nicely) girl cook along with the chef of the visiting restaurant (one of my mentors). The girl decided that this would be the perfect time for a drunken lecture about how stupid I was for quitting and how I can learn so much from this place. “I can’t believe you leave, you can learn so much from this guys! Look at you, you cry, and for what? dey see you, dey don’t respect dat. You are…I cannot think of the word in english…EH! QUEL EST LE MOT POUR FAIBLE DANS L’ANGLAIS ?” she yells across the kitchen to the visiting chef.

 He looks up from his current conversation and in front of everyone he yells back his response “WEAK! DA WORD YOU ARE LOOKING FOR IT IS WEAK!”

“Yes you are weak!” she tells me. “Stop crying!”

By that time still weeping I finished putting up desserts, I thanked her for the talk and trying to help. I know she was just meaning to give me some advice. I went outside and completely broke down it was building up inside these last two weeks. So much for going out on a good note, I remembered this one food runners last shift and the chef said to him, “don’t fuck up tonight because then that is all we will remember you by, you will be the guy who fucked up.” Everyone laughed when he said that because I think it was a joke, but that flashed through my head the moment I fucked up. I called Bryan and Kyle and and told them what happened they felt bad for me but also laughed their asses off. Kyle told me to shake it off and go have a drink.