Memoir

/ˈmemˌwär/ noun. a record of events written by a person having intimate knowledge of them and based on personal observation. Usually memoirs. an account of one's personal life and experiences; autobiography. the published record of the proceedings of a group or organization, as of a learned society.

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We’re on the 24th prompt of Memoir Monday! This one dredged up a lot of old memories for me. I had totally forgotten about the chaos, life lessons, and fun of restaurant work but writing this allowed me to relive the memories of all those many summers ago.

Memoir Monday has grown so much that I won’t be able to comment on everyone’s posts anymore (and get my own work done) but I’ll still be supporting your posts with reblogs, votes, and shares on my other social media accounts (X, Facebook, etc.).

For all of those who’ve regularly participated in Memoir Monday - keep going, you’re making great progress in chronicling your very own life story for future generations to enjoy.

For those who missed the inaugural post explaining what the Memoir Monday initiative is all about you can find it here.

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Now for next week’s Memoir Monday prompt:

How did you get your first job?

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My answer:

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I started cutting peoples’ lawns in our neighborhood as soon as I was tall enough to push the lawn mower until I got a Columbus Dispatch newspaper route when I was fifteen. I was ten years old when I started working. It was fascinating to me that I could take that piece of equipment, the lawn mower, and some of my time and get paid for it. My dad did a great job of explaining how to approach it like a real business. He explained how I had to set aside some of my earnings for gasoline and taught me how to cut the lawns safely and properly.

I think the most I ever made was $5 per lawn but this was around 1981 and it seemed like a lot of money for a ten year old. This early foray into entrepreneurship taught me so many lessons - responsibility, how to deal with people/customers, how important the quality of your work is, and the value of a dollar. Cutting lawns really did lay the foundation for my entire working life. I don’t think I ever enjoyed working for someone else as much as I did working for myself. I could make all my own decisions and there were no impediments to what I could achieve.

My first time getting what would be considered a “real” paycheck from an employer was a restaurant job at Boardwalk Coney Island restaurant on Main Street in Columbus, Ohio. My friend Matt was hired first and then I took a job there a few weeks later. I think I made around $3.50 an hour in 1986.

I got extremely lucky and found this old Boardwalk Coney Island ad on social media.

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As you can see from the photo above, their menu was pretty basic but these were some of the best hotdogs I’ve ever tasted. Pete Smerles, the owner, gave us employees all the free food we could eat during our shift and I gained forty pounds in the two years I worked there. Their coney sauce was a closely guarded secret family recipe from Greece and tasted a lot like Skyline Chili. I started as a dishwasher the summer I turned fifteen and progressed to doing just about everything from cook to cashier in the two years I worked there.

In the evenings the restaurant would show old silent films from Laurel and Hardy and Charlie Chaplain in the dining room for free. Pete always insinuated that the owner of the building the restaurant occupied was a member of the mob but I'm not certain of it. I’ll never forget how nervous Pete would get when the landlord came to collect the rent every month.

In the evenings the restaurant would show old silent films from Laurel and Hardy and Charlie Chaplain in the dining room for free. Pete always whispered insinuations that the owner of the building the restaurant occupied was a member of the mob but I can't confirm or deny it. All I know is Pete would get very nervous when the landlord came to collect the rent every month.

The landlord, Guy was his name, was an older barrel chested man who drove a Lincoln Continental and always had a cigar dangling from the corner of his mouth. We were always told to make whatever Guy wanted to eat for free and then Pete would reluctantly go back to the dining room and sit with Guy while he scarfed down his food. We always knew to steer clear of Pete after Guy left because he’d be in a bad mood for the rest of the day.

This first restaurant job taught me a lot about how to deal with the public, have a thick skin, work cohesively with a team, and how to keep a clear head under pressure. Restaurant work is some of the hardest work I’ve ever done in my life. We were told to never be standing still, during quiet times we were always cleaning. I remember the lunch rushes at Boardwalk Coney Island could be absolutely brutal.

There was a truck driving school a block down the road and a lot of the trainees would walk down to Boardwalk for lunch. There was often a line of people out the door from 11:30am until 1:00pm. There could be no breakdowns in getting the food out correctly and quickly or pandemonium would ensue and it sometimes did.

A lot of those would-be truckers were, shall we say “rough around the edges” and would sometimes mouth off or threaten us if we got their orders wrong. Now Pete was from a different era and extremely tough, he threw several of those guys out of the restaurant if they got out of hand. He also kept a baseball bat behind the counter as a last resort. He was very protective of his employees and didn't tolerate any foolishness, I never remember feeling unsafe despite the almost constant chaos. Although I never witnessed it, some of the older employees told us that Pete would absolutely use that bat if he had to.

I would go home at the end of my shift smelling like hotdogs and utterly exhausted, drenched in sweat from the constant heat of the kitchen, with sore feet. Little did I know I was also coming home with lessons that would be useful for the rest of my life.

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Rules of Engagement

1. Please reblog this first post and share on other social platforms so we cast the widest net possible for this initiative;
2. Pictures paint a thousand words. Include pictures in your posts if you have them;
3. Answer each Memoir Monday prompt question in your own post. If possible, the prompt question will be published in the week prior so you'll have the entire week to answer and publish your own post;
4. Have fun with it, don't worry about getting behind, or jumping into the project at any point after we've begun; and
5. Lastly, be sure to include the tag #memoirmonday.

It's that simple.

At the end of the next twelve months we'll have created something immensely valuable together. It's so important to know our "whys" in life and there's no better way to do that than this.

Someday all that will be left of our existence are memories of us, our deeds, and words. It's up to you to leave as rich of a heritage as possible for future generations to learn from. So, go ahead, tell your stories. I can't wait to read them.

Be well and make the most of this day. I want to sincerely thank all of the participants thus far. I've really enjoyed reading your posts!

~Eric Vance Walton~

(All photos are original.)

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