Working in a restaurant has a unique dynamic to it – we don’t all have the same days off so during my last week I found myself checking the schedule every day and making a mental note of the people I was working with for the last time. So, for me, the goodbyes stretched over several days culminating in, of course, my last shift on Sunday, February 24th.
In a final show of respect my managers had me train a new server on my last shift. I have to admit that training people is something I take alot of pride in and enjoy immensely. The shift itself was somewhat lackluster as it was also the night for the Academy Awards so it was pretty slow but I didn’t care – I just wanted to take it all in.
Anyway, my last table ended up being somewhat serendipitous as they were three girls celebrating the fact that one of them would be flying off to Germany the next day for an indefinite time. I let them know about the serendipity of it all and at the end I stopped by with a bon voyage piece of cheesecake. I was met with “Oh, you didn’t have to do that!“. My response was simply “Of course I did because my farewell dinner is tomorrow and I know I would love for somebody to do that for me too“. Little did I know…
My farewell dinner was perfect and was almost exactly how I had envisioned it months ago. I don’t have a huge group of friends but the friends I do have are amazing. The Keg I worked at was in West Vancouver and most of my friends had to travel quite a distance to get there – Burnaby, Langley, South Vancouver. Like I said – amazing friends.
Anyway, I knew this would be an all night affair because, while the reservation was for 7pm, I knew different people would show up and join us later through the night. So we had some wine and some appetizers and actually didn’t order dinner until 8:30. This was actually a perfect dinner for me because I had just spent a frantic day cleaning and moving and honestly just wanted to sit back, relax, and soak it all in.
We told stories, drank wine, did some shots, had an amazing dinner and then, totally unexpectedly, a big ice cream cake was brought out with the words bon voyage written on it. Now, I know our restaurant doesn’t serve ice cream cake so I was brought to tears knowing that our server, Genn, had gone out and bought it herself earlier. One of the most touching gestures I have ever had towards me.
When I pictured this dinner there was never a doubt who I wanted to serve us, so if you’re reading this – Thank you Genn – I will miss you alot!
I will miss everyone alot.
