Has The Time Come?

Some days you feel like you are being forced backwards on to the edge of the cliff. Even if its ultimately for your own good you rarely appreciate it.

I’m a snap decision kind of girl so this backing gently towards the summit doesn’t make me comfortable.

I’ll start by saying I love my job.

Being the concierge, chef’s assistant, occasional activities assistant and sometime night security Jill of all trades suits me just fine. As do my hours. Hospitality without working any weekends.

That being said there have been monumental changes over the past few months that have made me re-evaluate how I feel about my job.

I am a massive forward projectionist and this isn’t always a good thing.

My Manager, Mr has it altogether has left the company leaving in his wake as yet no new manager to take over. This worries me going in to the long haul shifts of summer. It means that we may get stuck with more visits from the company owner than are good for anyone.

Mr Company owner is a born meddler. He can’t help but stick his nose in stuff that he has no idea about. Whenever he appears all of our planning goes out the window. It’s hard to keep a leash on him because he is one of those people who must stick his fingers in everyone’s pie.

In terms of food production, we have a count. All prep work comes with a number. The number of clients + the number of instructors on site + the type of food being prepped + 20% overs on the just in case scenario. And that’s the mass produced. Add to this the number of adult visitors in camp who get specialized meals five times a day and add two extra again on the just in case scenario.  

When the Company owner appears all of it goes out the window as he lavishly hands out three of four of an item when the portion size is one of that item and pretty soon it adds up to not enough items to feed the group. This of course leads to screaming, tantrums and recriminations about us not being prepared.

Were we to over prep then we’d be left with so many overs the wastage would be off the charts again leading to screaming and recrimination.

In fact, the Company Owner usually does this meddling at head office, which is why I work on the southern campus. With no manager the likely hood of his turning up on a daily basis like a ragged superhero could well be the new reality.

So one step closer to the edge.

Step two, our amazing beyond brilliant night security lady has left the company and is off overseas for four months. Which means having to train yet another person to do the job or what most likely will happen, I’ll get called on to do nights and days. We finally found a great night person who does her job well and is always on time. In the past our night staff have been less than punctual, sometimes just outright not present and after a thirteen hour shift I have been called to do another ten hours straight up. And I must say “I’m getting too old for that shit.”

Shuffling closer now…. And another step.

Our staff turnover is quite high. Given that we’ve been in a client drought this year I can’t blame them. Not having any work and therefore no pay for months on end, well, people get jack of that and leave in droves. Which leads to a bunch of barely trained people coming in each term.

New staff shit us to tears. Because they are trained at head office where there is always a glut of extra staff on hand they come down to us expecting to have an easy day. We run skeleton staff most of the time so its everyone in for the long haul. It’s just the way we have always had to do things. Getting people up to speed whilst handling large quantities of children can be stressful enough when everything goes to plan. But insert the first two steps and you’ll see why this step is a double leap.

And with my heels almost to the drop off I find that at my time of life I really have trouble being gracious and enthusiastic when I see my friends all jetting off on exotic holidays and here I am stuck in a job that doesn’t pay me well to start with and is reliant on the whims of the flim flam man in charge.

 By rights it all should add up to me wanting to get out of this job and into something that pays the bills every week, that allows me to earn the money I am actually entitled to and has a roster that isn’t a state secret.

So why the hesitation you may ask?

Why don’t I turn around and take that solid leap off the edge and free fall?

Because as I said I love my job. I love working at what I do, I loathe the idea of being on some split shifted nightmare roster that sees me free on Tuesdays. Who the fuck else is free on Tuesdays?

The next few weeks will decide me one way or another. 

It's A Chef's Life.

It took me a long time to work out just exactly what I wanted to be.

You could say I am a girl who has had a few careers.

It wasn’t until I turned 40 that I landed a job by accident working in a kitchen.

Perhaps the utter frustration of having worked in the welfare sector for so long made this new job seem perfect.

After all, if you follow a recipe you get results.

We’ll as I found out not always.

However, I took to it like a duck to water. I like precision, I like consistency. I also like to push the boundaries. I’m a Virgo so maybe cheffing is my perfect vocation.

Coming in to it all so late in life gave me pause to wonder what I had gotten myself into.

Long days stretching into even longer nights I was used to in my previous job.

What I wasn’t ready for was the absolutely personal nature of the insults, the put downs, the constant stress and pressure.

I’m not a girl who is ever going to be treated like a doormat just because someone has a piece of paper that says chef and an attitude that would topple the Empire state building.

And I am happy to stand my ground.

As the rookie in the kitchen I found that it was presumed I would be all yes chef, no chef, three bags full chef and for a while I was.

I switched kitchens half way through my first year and found myself working in a small town pub with a chef whose attitude left much to be desired.

It was the local watering hole and the food was there only as a side to soak up the alcohol.

The owner of the bar was a fan of pseudo Chinese meals and they were run of mill to say the least. Think the least interesting Australian take on a Chinese meal and add in some sesame seeds and bobs your uncle.

The head chef suffered from what I like to call limp dick syndrome. Never happy, always demanding even though he was no Ramsey, Oliver or Pierre – White and never would be.

Booze soaked and with a definite female hating attitude I found that life under him was always going to be a test of my patience.

Abuse was a daily part of my life working in this place. Not always directed at me because I think eventually I would have snapped and thrown something at him, but it wasn’t unusual to find that Chef was having bad day and throwing stock or equipment around, or calling the girl downstairs a slut, a mole, a useless piece of shit.

And if the downstairs bar staff happened to talk back he would at times race down a narrow switchback flight of stairs and take issue with them on the bar floor in front of customers who were all quite used to the prick in the apron.

We always hoped that one day he would lose his footing and take a tumble that would keep him away from the kitchen for weeks at least. Never happened.

In theory you should be able to report that sort of abusive behaviour to the manner or the owner but to make a complaint would see you branded as a whinging female, not thick skinned enough to take the normal environment of the kitchen.

It took me a while to learn that behaviour such as I was exposed to is never okay. Nobody should be allowed to speak to you in a manner that is designed to make you feel like a cockroach.

On those precious days off Chef had every week we all breathed easier. Work was fun on those days no matter how slammed we got.

Eventually the showdown came and rather than bow to yet another epic chef tantrum I resigned from the job I loathed and went back to the original kitchen I started in.

Better seasoned and able to cope with the demands of diva’s with dietary requirements I’ve been at it now for four years.

Five For Friday.

It’s almost the weekend so let’s make this easy.

1. The Carousel -  What song got stuck in your head this week?

The Title theme from the Outlander Series.

2. The Endorphin Spike - What made you laugh out loud?

Lunch with my best girlfriend who is off to see the world for four months.

Way too much cumin used in my salad but her face was priceless when she tried it unawares.

3. The Duh Moment - Your do over moment of the week?

Staying up on a Gen Quest until I was chilled to the bone – hence sniffles.

4. The Pot of Gold at the end of the Rainbow - What are you looking forward to?

They’ve forecast sunshine for the weekend. At last.

5. The Mental Health Check - How was your day?

Awesome and then a nap.

I Dreamed A Dream

“I had the strangest dream, and you were in it, and you and so were you.” So said Dorothy Gale.

This morning I know what she was talking about.

Last night’s episode of what went on in Ky’s head was a doozy.

I was at a wedding venue, attending a bride I had not seen in 20 years. She was marrying an old school friend who I also haven’t seen in decades. Why would I believe this and not simply wake up then with the “what the?” face and go back to sleep.

Simple really, the bridesmaid’s dresses were hideous thereby tricking my brain into thinking this was all for real.

The vista was interesting, a building filled with glass and natural light stood perched on top of the crest of a hill. The outlook, spectacular, green fields burnished almost yellow in the sunlight and blue sky as far as the eye could see. Although the building seemed squat and possibly double storied the elevator went up 14 floors. The furnishings and appointments of this squat but spacious wedding venue were all sparkling gold, marble floors, opulence to make you vomit. Think Versace in decorating overdrive.

Coming out on this fourteenth floor revealed sunlight puddling around a gigantic bath shaped like shell. Huge windows overlooked the bathing area, in fact the entire room was made of glass. In the water floated rose petals and candles, and the unfortunate bride, face down and encumbered by a veil that could easily have done double duty as the hall runner in St Paul’s Cathedral, London. 

It was around that time that I panicked. I knew that downstairs the congregation awaited the entrance of this bride. That her groom was there. That’s I was going to have to go down and tell them all what had happened.

So down I went, dreading those mirrored elevator doors opening.

The congregation was set, all sitting up in their chairs waiting. I scanned the room. All of the senior figures from my own place of work were there. My boss was there, juggling flaming balls and placating the increasingly restless crowd. And in the middle of all of this my youngest child was entertaining himself with a pool of dolphins doing tricks that no one else observed.

I backed away, back into that elevator and started slamming the up button. Where I expected to get off I didn’t know, what difference between the drowning bride or the crowd who would soon be baying for blood?

The elevator shot up and at a breath taking speed. The floor counter ticking over with rapidity, until the words ORBIT were printed on the screen as we burst through the top of the building and sailed out over the crest off that hill.

Everything went black and then suddenly I found myself sitting in a heap of vile lavender bridesmaid dress staring down at a scene from my childhood. The paddock at the back of my mother’s house was there in front of me, a bonfire being built and people tossing a ball around, all people I’ve known over the past twenty years. I felt this overwhelming sense of peace and tranquillity. And I smiled.

And woke up thinking “What the actual fuck was that?”

Husband Number 2 theorised that it was my fears of the coming work schedule that created the dream. And to an extent he may be right.

My well-loved, well respected, highly organised manager has left his job and I can only wonder with growing terror who might replace him.

For the last two and a half years I’ve worked as the chef’s assistant / concierge / jack of all trades at a children’s camp. And I must say I love my job, I thrive on it.

The boss however is unorganized, makes snap judgement s, basically comes in and fucks up everything. If the boss were to come down and try to manage whilst he found a replacement it would be the clusterfuck to end all clusterfucks. He’s micromanaging every last detail and managing to manage nothing with any positive outcome.

 This worries me, as I am given to thinking that perhaps it’s time get off a sinking ship and I can see the relativity of the dream in that context..

Dragon Slaying In The Modern Era.

I learnt something about myself recently.

This isn’t a new revelation; it’s been dawning for quite a while.

I grew up in a walled off environment. A place where you were not allowed to develop a self that deviated from an already mapped out plan. A place where if you stepped off the pre-ordained path you were punished and then shoved right back onto that path. A place where individuality was almost criminal, where personal development was a heretic notion, where being anything other than a predestined automaton was not allowed.

I broke free relatively early but those insidious lessons remained in the background of my mind, always there to through the shadow of the doubt over me.

The enlightenment process has taken 20 odd years to come to fruition, but come it did in one massive temper tantrum – thankfully not mine.

My mother turned 70 this year and we thought, well if not now not when and organised a surprise birthday party. Tracked down old friends, contacted her newer friends, invited family from far and wide.  And they accepted without hesitation.

Preparations were made, a venue was booked.

And then the storm clouds started rumbling in.

Four days out from the party I got a call from dad, he was forced to tell her about the party due to her increasingly erratic behaviour.

And all hell broke loose.

In the temper tantrum to end them all she insisted by verbal abuse and the whole “You have no right” threat to make sure the party was cancelled. Being thoroughly sick of over forty years of vitriol I decided if she wanted to cancel her own party she could do it herself.

Something snapped that day.

I refuse to be abused for helping to organise a birthday party.

Enough of this demoralising brain washing that we have been submitting to for so long.

Mothers oft preached sermon of “You’re not good enough, don’t ever bring your friends home because what will people think,” was about to commence.

Of course my father who so wanted to do this one nice thing for her was directly in the firing line of all that venom. Put my mother in a pit of vipers and you’d find she’d emerge some time later from a pit full of terrified suicidal snakes.

Dad had, three weeks earlier undergone quadruple bypass surgery. His last words to me before going into theater were “This party for your mum goes ahead no matter what happens”.

I watched my mother snatch the list of invitee’s and start dialling.

All sweetness and light explaining to some of the invitee’s that she was just so tired she was cancelling the party, that dad had just been released from hospital after major surgery (in fact he was two weeks out and doing amazingly well) and she didn’t think it would be good for him to have all that excitement.

And then she’d hang up and proceed to berate my father, call him stupid, selfish, good for nothing, standing over him like the bully she is screaming “I wish you had died in surgery”.

For the relatives who were invited she let loose. No need to pretend to be a fine upstanding citizen, its only family.

Five For Friday.

It’s almost the weekend so let’s make this easy.

1. The Carousel -  What song got stuck in your head this week?

 “History” by One Direction.

2. The Endorphin Spike - What made you laugh out loud?

A phone call on speaker featuring all but one of the kids.

3. The Duh Moment - Your do over moment of the week?

Making dinner three nights ago I cremated my broccoli whilst looking after the other elements of the dish. And I do mean cremate which is pretty hard to do in a steamer but I managed.

4. The Pot of Gold At The End Of The Rainbow - What are you looking forward to?

Spending tonight down the coast in a 180-year-old inn, Settlers Arms, St Albans.

5. The Mental Health Check - How was your day?

Only half way over so I am cheating this week and filling it in early. Woke, could easily have snuggled back down and gone to sleep but Abracadabra, - it’s a perfect blue sky day. Up, debone a lamb, pack, exit. Holiday weekend. Smiling.

Just A Girl.

You realize of course, that a great idea, whilst uplifting and good for you can quickly unravel in the details. 

What starts as that tiny little shiver in your mind starts to glow and wisps of smoke appear as you project the future yes-ness of that one idea.

But of course without fuel that idea will eventually falter, dim, extinguish itself.

I want to start writing again. I so miss putting words together on a page.

Here I am confronted by the mocking blank page.

To relaunch my Chronicle’s requires a story to tell. A quest, an adventure, a hook, an angle. And straight away I am confronted by a former blog demon – a way to categorize, to know which audience to target.

I am a girl without a category. Always have been.

I was perusing the mommy blogger sites, those titan heavyweights of breakfast cereal and domestic disaster blogging. Seems if you live a healthy lifestyle, give tips on how to mix stuff with yogurt to make it taste like ice cream, or you happen to invent a sick child, you have it made, daily fodder for millions.

My overriding problem right now is I’m just not that into anything to sit and write a dedicated 3000 words a week on any given subject.

Flotsam and Jetsam should have been my middle names.

To define oneself, to take a serious look at the material of your mind, well that takes practice, which is why most blog writers falter and stray away to other less demanding pursuits.

In my last session of the chronicles I had a cast, star studded with the most over the top characters, all real life people bent on their own destruction. It gave me reams of fodder. And now I live a life less Dante – esque.

There are of course exceptions to this, I do still have those few who will at some stage inspire me to describe them and their antics in vitriolic detail.

I still encounter in everyday life people whose personalities are given one word descriptors,

The Vituperative, the Lachrymose, The Odious, The Insouciant and the man who can be positively Pecksniffian in his manner. They will all at some stage feature in my writings, how could I not take literary advantage of such encounters.

But to categorise me right from the start, Gwen Stefani said it best – “I’m just girl in the world….”

Coming Home and Starting Again.

A friend asked me not so long ago, “Do you still blog?”

No. In truth I haven’t blogged seriously for almost eight years.

A few days ago I came across a hidden gem in my bottomless hard drive – a copy of the entire Kate Isis Chronicles Blog that I started in 2006.

And it got me thinking, I miss it. The formulation of a post, the blogging community, the support, the way comments from old friends always made me smile.

Reading back over those years of posting made me laugh, made me think, made me remember.

I really was a lost little girl back then. Ranty, righteous, so conflicted, such a mess.

So much has changed in a decade. Once a high risk, high needs youth worker, I now work as a chef’s assistant in a children’s camp. Long hours, sore feet, many more scars and I love it.

Once a fluorescent pink haired diva I’m a lot more settled now, not to say that I am any less complicated but with age comes the wisdom to know what battles to pursue.

I still write, in fact I can’t imagine a world where I don’t write in some form.  Mainly I’ve been concentrating on books. Very personal books meant for one recipient but contributed to by many.

And my quest for peace in terms of not having a family of my own, well let’s just say that’s settled. I have two husbands, because I may have changed and grown up but I’m always going to be a little controversial, three amazing children who although not biologically my own are mine absolutely and completely and two grandchildren.

As to the world I once inhabited it’s all but gone.

Here’s the situation with the myriad cast of characters written about in the Kate Isis Chronicles as it stands a decade on.

The Husband – Oh long suffering man. He who has lived through it all and can tell the tales to prove it. Still together, currently in the living room, most probably on his phone.

Super Dad and Cruella – Super Dad never did get any justice from the court system, however his long lost and battled for youngest child Dobby returned to his father of his own choice when he was old enough to. The other children, Madame Messy and Master Skitchy are doing well. Madame Messy is mother to three beautiful boys. Master Skitchy is now father to a little girl. Sadly, with his partner it’s a case of history repeating itself. The more things change the more they stay the same.

Cruella continues to be unstable. She remarried, had two more children and did the same to husband number two. He recently died after nine months of not seeing his children and she is now happily spending his life insurance on boob jobs, Botox and fast cars.

You can’t cure stupid.

Vic The Groover - happily married to a lovely lady, just bought a farm and busy travelling all over the world. Perhaps I will persuade her to come back to the blogosphere. Speak to her occasionally although we currently live about 300 kilometres apart.

 Joe Murphy Mutt – The puppy I rescued after a massive storm. Still with us, no longer a puppy – yep those massive puppy paws foretold the coming of a big dog. More human than dog. Most often to be found curled up on someone’s lap begging for treats. A dog without shame.

The Brother in The Back Room – Finally moved out once and for all. Hard to use the word happy in a description of him but he is living in a long term relationship with a girl who definitely won’t take his bullshit. If you ever want to see a living saint just google my sister in law. 

Voldemort – My on again off again torment, gone to where all bastards go and may he live a long and happy life.

Mr Cellophane – A man who ultimately taught me so much about how I refuse to be treated. Peter Gabriel said it best when he sang “In games without frontiers, war without tears. If looks could kill, they probably will.”  Banished without a return ticket.

Aquaman – The river loving ex who once asked me to come swimming with him in shark infested waters whilst he was bleeding. Finally ditched the witch of a wife. Moved out of the big city. At present living happily as part of our unholy trifecta.