A Little Fear, A Lot of Dreams

Tam is an awesome cook. With no formal training, she can turn out an amazing meal, not just for our family, but for an entire school as well. Two schools, actually. She does her job well, supports her manager, and has spent every year working for the schools being bullied by upper management.

Seriously bullied. One of the managers will come to the school kitchen, and even if everything is going well, she’ll search until she finds something to bitch about. What’s more, she’ll blame it all on Tam, even if Tam has nothing to do with the problem.

It’s been like that ever since she started working there, and quite frankly, it’s really starting to wear on her.

And us.

I’ve wanted her to do something about it, complain to the Director, or whoever is in charge and can do something about it, but she won’t. I understand, if she complains and things go south, her work environment can go from bad to intolerable. I can relate, since I’m in a similar situation, but this post isn’t about me, at least not directly.

For my beloved Tam, things really came to a head when she was ganged up upon by menopause, depression, and the bully boss, all in one day. It was quickly resolved by a quick trip home for her menopause meds, but during her 10 minute absence, a rumor was spread that she had “had a breakdown” and that pissed her off.

Like she needed that added pile of shit dropped on her plate.

To say it was a stressful week would be a ridiculous understatement and a callous disregard of my partner’s pain.

We are big fans of the Food Network channel. We watch the shows about bad cooks, creative cooks, amazing chefs, and regular people doing something amazing with food. Tam loves to work with food, which is one reason she works where she does. But after this past week, she’s no longer sure she wants to do this.

Correction, she’s quite sure she no longer wants to work for those people. She’s also sure she wants to continue working with food. She also wants to be her own boss.

I did ask her to wait until after this summer to make her decision to quit and find employment elsewhere so we can have one last vacation together. She promised me to wait until the end of the school year to make any decisions.

So, this weekend, we’ve been discussing options, and her favorite has been the idea of opening her own restaurant. Breakfast and lunch, simple and delicious. But we both know how difficult it is to run a restaurant as well as how quickly they can fail, however, that doesn’t stop us from examining all the possibilities. Believe me when I say, there are a LOT of possibilities.

My plan will be to continue working where I am, in order for us to keep a roof over our heads. She needs to get out of that toxic environment, and I’m willing to do whatever is necessary to help her get to where she wants to be.

I will admit, it’s a scary prospect, but at the same time, I’ve also always wanted to have a restaurant, so the thought of being so close to the action is kind of exciting.

The thought of being that close to poverty is exciting, too, only not quite in the same way.

Either way, it’s going to be an interesting year once we get things sorted out.