La Licenciada Lavatrastes or the Degreed Dishwasher

I have always seemed to be a person drawn to extremes. I like to see how far I can push things. I don’t want to do things halfway and I don’t want to be bored or worse, seem boring. My family might even go so far as to call me a bit melodramatic. I don’t know that I want to claim that trait but I must admit that it gives me a strange kind of pleasure to tell people that I, an almost 40 white American woman with a college degree, am working as a dishwasher at a Mexican restaurant. There is more to it than simple shock value, and I really don’t think its just about making people uncomfortable. I am sure to post many more musings on why this is my job of choice at the moment, and a lot of them may make sense due all sorts of different factors, but a simple explanation is I like high contrast. I like being different. I like being the only woman and the only American. And even though it can be extremely humbling there is something very interesting in being an “educated” person struggling to learn a job that seems to have been so easily mastered by many who didn’t have the chance to finish elementary school. I like what I am learning about myself, what I am capable of doing, and learning about the people around me. And I think it about to get even more interesting as I have actually resigned from my dishwasher job at one Mexican restaurant to take both a slightly higher level kitchen job at a different Mexican restaurant AND a dishwasher/prep job at a big nice corporate chain restaurant. There are sure to be juxtapositions galore awaiting me. Despite knowing it will not add a single hour to my life I am full of worries about both these new jobs. But even though I can expect long hours of repeating similar tasks I do not expect to be bored. I believe I am on embarking on an interesting and enlightening adventure, one that will make me a more well-rounded and empathetic person, and also provide interesting antedotes to share along the way.

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