Dear Karen’s,
Why am I compelled to cry in the walk-in fridge? Because crying in the walk-in fridge helps me with the rage I concoct during a shift. Because I cannot angrily snap at the poor woman who messed up her own online order. Because the chain I work in dispositions me, and the walk-in fridge provides a cool comfort that no human can achieve. By crying in the walk-in fridge, I’m saving those around me from the ticking time-bomb named Exasperation.
A normal evening will go as so:
“Hello! Thank you for calling (pizza place), my name is Stella, how may I help you today?”
“I need to speak to a manager. My order is late! It say’s the driver left the store at 6:53pm and it’s already 7pm. I know my home is seven minutes away from the store!” Says the woman whose home is 8 miles away… And sometimes it may be our fault. Me and my staffs restaurant is understaffed (the pandemic the main cause), we drop an order, we took down the wrong address and our driver got lost, we put the wrong food with the wrong order, so many things we are doing at once. All the while with our masks firmly pressed to our noses, while yours dangles from your face or is nonexistent at all.
But I wonder, if in those times you held more empathy, less workers would relieve their emotions in the walk-in fridge.
The walk-in fridge is not pleasant. It is too cold, people barge in and out grabbing various items, it’s a tad dingy, it’s made of stainless steel, so I see my warped reflection in the metal. It feels at times like my face in the reflection is just a caricature of my own face, but when I’m so baffled and hurt from the words you spat at me (simply about pizza), perhaps that is just what I look like.
But I wonder, if in those times, you had your mask on correctly (or even on at all), more workers would have one less reason to enter the walk-in fridge.
This is the issue that hurts me the most. It raises my anxiety, makes me pinch my mask to my nose, it makes my face warp into the caricature it does when I enter the walk-in fridge. When you walk into the business I run (while on shift of course) and you don’t have one on, we all look at each other is disbelief… A year into this pandemic and you are angry at us for the policies in act for a year now.
I’m pleading as this point. I may have been angry before but that Exasperation, as time passes, fades, and I, along with my poor staff, feel defeated. We are defeated because of your anger and because we can still see your angry grimace, while you can’t see our lips quiver.
Our hidden grimaces.
Our hidden mumbles.
Our hidden cries.
Our hidden emotions.
Sincerely,
A fast food manager