The Crazy House

I'm approaching my two year anniversary working at The Crazy House aka the world's busiest airport.

My daughter works there now too, has since last Spring and thoroughly enjoy working with her. My oldest son worked with me there for a while and enjoyed working with him just the same. One of my managers jokingly said one day, "How awesome would it be to have a restaurant totally staffed with Cottons!"

If there's one thing we Cottons know how to do, is work hard and's nice when someone pays your family such a huge compliment.

My daughter's paying her own way through school now,  junior year and totally supports herself with very little financial help from me. It's a blessing.

I can say after almost two years working in an airport which had well over 100,000,000 passengers travel through in less than a year that wouldn't work anywhere else in it except the place I landed. (small pun)

I've always been a server, starting my career in 1979. For the first several years was just a means to get by. I wasn't all that great at it at first and pretty unreliable (hence getting fired from my first job) but as the years went on discovered I wasn't just "Waiting tables" but honing skills in my chosen profession of what I consider Sales and Marketing.

I've had some great managers and bosses over the years, all wonderful mentors along the way. I slowly but steadily climbed the serving ladder. With lots of hard work, determination, dedication (and some pure stinkin' luck) finally landed the job of a lifetime.

I took a leap of faith never thought I was capable of making. I was a server doing pretty okay  in a small local family owned restaurant for a family who treated me wonderfully after being dismissed from a large chain restaurant who totally dumped on me, and went from this...

to this...

I'm an almost fifty six year old woman who chose over thirty six years ago to be "a waitress".

I  never thought or dreamed in a million years that a waitress could make a seventy thousand dollar salary with full benefits, paid vacation, paid sick leave and have a 401K package but now I do.

Don't get me wrong, I constantly and consistently work my butt off and's a logistical nightmare traveling to and from the job. I tip out sometimes thirty or forty bucks in a shift to support staff but is exactly what they do...support and assist me in making that salary. Parking is ridiculous, twelve dollars a day but is just five minutes from my vehicle to the security checkpoint and one minute later am clocking in at the restaurant.

I will have to say out of my two years working there have only had two bad days and that's pretty good odds, especially in the serving world.

We work hard for our money and if don't work hard certainly don't make it. (as it should be)

On top of that have met people from all over the globe. I've met and waited on famous people and met some of the most interesting and inspiring people I'd never meet except  working in the only five star restaurant in the world's busiest airport. It's not like I'm gonna run into Trent Lott, John Schuerholz, Shaq or Ang Lee in Red Lobster.

It's really the un famous peeps I like meeting the most.

Case in point.

Just the other night walked by a man sitting alone who I wasn't even waiting on. He flagged me down and said "Hey!! How are you, remember me?"

Of course did the same thing you do when pushing a cart through the grocery store and someone obviously knows you but have no clue who they are.

I smiled and enthusiastically said "Oh my goodness! How have you been?!"

Then he said "Remember when you waited on me when my wife and I sat out there? (gesturing toward the patio tables) I said you were the best server I'd ever had and wasn't one to hand out compliments lightly."

It was like a light bulb suddenly came on.

Believe it or not the little hamster in my empty head started running on that wheel again and somehow came back with "Yes! Don't you sell Veterinary supplies?"

He smiled and nodded.

Dang,  got it right! (thank you lil' hamster)

I'd waited on them several months ago on their way to Poland to adopt five siblings from an orphanage. They already had five kids of their own together but giving five more sibs freedom from spending their entire youth in an orphanage then pushed out into a world unloved, to survive.

Talk about a Brady Bunch.

 I asked if he had any pictures? He said had been a long process and were finally to the stage where they had to stay in Poland, in an apartment with the five sibs to bond and get acclimated with each other. He had been there for two weeks but came back to check on his own five, being taken care of by a close (somewhat) Au Pair.


He patted the seat next to him and I sat down for him to show me videos of the five in Poland. Ages ranging from five to twelve. Their five bio kids range from six to fourteen.

There was a video of his wife driving them all in a van to go eat. Those kids looked incredibly happy, and so did their new mom. I asked if they spoke English and he shook his head, then said communication was the least of their problems. He showed me pictures of the boys kicking around a soccer ball in the apartment and another video of the youngest girl singing at the top of her lungs and looking ecstatic.
"She only has one volume...loud" he said, smiling from ear to ear.

There are over 80,000 orphans in Poland in 350 orphanages, soon five less thanks to this wonderful couple who luckily have the money and means to give them an excellent life here in what I consider the greatest country in the free world.

The two sets of soon to be ten sibs still haven't met but the man told me they skype and facetime every single day and are looking forward to meeting face to face on American soil.

It warms my heart to know these kids are coming to America and be raised, loved and given every opportunity to succeed.

I made him promise and one day bring the entire family in so I could meet them all. He assured me whenever they took a vacation and traveled through Atlanta would come in to eat and ask for me.

Adopt: To take into one's family through legal means and raise as one's own child.

What an absolutely marvelous thing to do if you can, and this couple is!

It's a fact, children are our future.

It could be in Africa or Poland or even in our own backyard. It's up to us to save our future.

I think the only  people I've been more impressed with meeting are soldiers who frequently come in to eat on their way (sometimes back) to Dubai and continuing to Afghanistan and other hot beds of hostility.

Case in point,  waited on two young men just tonight doing exactly that...going back. I told them to keep their heads down low and would have prayers for them going high.

Compared to all these people I'm a simpleton, a nothing but thanks to them the world will be a better place for not only me but you.

Til next time... COTTON

I'm a Different Kind of Woman For Sure

I suppose I clean up okay(ish) but have never been one to fuss a lot about the way I look. I pay less than fifteen dollars for a hair cut, sometimes six ninety nine and looks just fine to me.

At least have always been trim and fit, a little too trim these past few years but beats being a fifty something year old load of lard.

I wasn't a very girly little girl either...case in point.

On the other hand my daughter through no doing of my own has always been a girlie girl.

I've only worked at three different restaurants over the last twenty five years but at every one of them the younger waitresses (old school term) could never believe I'd never had a pedicure or manicure. They almost acted shocked, like I was underprivileged.

I've never even considered going to a salon. Don't get me wrong, when my daughter was younger I took her to have her nails done with her best friend. Seemed like a total waste of money to me and the smell in the place was horrific at best. No wonder they wore masks. I always thought it was because of the stinky feet. The girls were thrilled though and felt all grown up with their french tipped nails which lasted about eight hours.

I've always been more concerned with what I can do with my hands and feet...and has turned out to be quite a lot.

A few years ago when they were building a new Sports Academy here in Newnan, the landscapers had tons and tons of sod scraps piled up by a curb. I asked the foreman if I could have them and he said sure. It took me six trunk loads in my car but hauled them all home to cover a bare patch in my front yard , about a twenty square foot area. I pieced them all together and watered it every day.

...BAM!

About ten years ago when they were building a new subdivision up the road from us did the same thing there, hauling home about twenty trunk loads in my Passat and covered the bare dirt hill beside my house, about a fifty foot square area.

My feet may not be pretty but work pretty well.

Here's the thing. I love working in the yards but in the hot summer heat of the south do it in my tattered Levi shorts I've had  for thirty years or some of Massey's old Guard shorts, a bathing suit top (luckily am a 32A) and flip flops.

I dress for success and successful I have been.

When Tim moved to Texas over a year ago, everything here at the house fell on me. The gas company left a note on my door that we (now I) needed to remove the ivy and weeds covering our gas meter so they could read it.

Bam!! (once again)

The entire end of our house was covered but after two days of hacking and hauling had the whole side cleared.

Granted it took a toll on my hands and feet but felt wonderful to come home down our street and see how much of a difference a little sweat could make.

Dang! This girl did need a manicure so I bought a little stick cuticle trimmer and got busy.

Maybe I got a little too busy. The bandage is covering where I also slit my finger open on a broken wine glass at work.

My husband may be living a thousand miles away but my best buddy was still here and rode him like crazy.

I love my Johnny Dear!

I maintain a pretty nice yard, about an acre. I also cut my elderly neighbors yard next door, almost another acre. For the past six years have also picked up trash, cut and weed eated the front of our subdivision, about half an acre.

As Jed Clampett would slowly say "Pitiful...just pitiful."

This past Christmas a fellow co worker asked if she could take me for a mani/pedi as a present and finally agreed. The Holiday Season is crazy for everyone so decided to wait until after the first of the year.

So yesterday it finally happened. I went for my first ever mani/pedi. We decided to make it a girls day and my daughter (who works with us both) came along as well.

Talk about a fish out of water in the water!

I did have the good sense to shave my legs before going, knowing they would be exposed. Otherwise would have never happened... until shorts season.

I was confused from the time we all three walked in, especially with the other two having done this mani times before. (small pun intended)

Of course all the employees were Asian but the place smelt okay and looked clean, relieving my initial apprehension.

"You peek you colla" was the first thing they said to me? Confused again, my daughter told me to pick what color polish I wanted.

They had three chairs together for us and I sat down first. Good thing, mine took much longer than theirs.

I kinda felt like I was in a sweat shop but no one else appeared to feel that way so went with it.

I admitted to the woman assigned to me that had never had a manicure or pedicure. She looked at me like I was crazier than I am and told me to "soak feet" so I did.

Actually felt pretty wonderful. They had massage chairs so bonus points my aching back got some free loving too.

The foot part went okay until she filed my hooves with her little hand held cheese grater. I was relaxing and grooving to the free back massage from the chair when she tapped on my leg to show me her grater filled with about a quarter cup of dead skin. I could have done without seeing that but reinforced my decision in going at all.

Then she sat a little dish full of liquid on the arm of my chair. My daughter had to tell me what to do. Immediately made me think of the old Madge the manicurist commercials.

Here's where the story gets really good.

My daughter sitting next to me whips out her phone and shows my hand surgeon (nothing less than) the picture of where I tried to trim my own cuticles.

My little Asian surgeon looked at the photo, literally stopped what she was doing, dropped my hand, peered at the photo, then at me and quizzically asked "Why??"

It took her thirty minutes longer to finish with me than Massey or Ana's treatment took.

I finally got presented with the ridiculous flat flip flops and wandered behind my surgeon as she led me to the front of the shop. She wanted me to sit at a table by the front door for some reason and finally Massey told me it was a drying table. The little woman pointed to a ledge below and said to put my feet there. I put them on top of the ledge and once again shook her head (she did that a lot with me) saying "No! Under, under !!!"

Needless to say Massey and Ana got quite the kick out of all my faux pas but the end result was actually amazing.

It was the nicest thing anyone has done for me in quite a while and thoroughly enjoyed it after my initial embarrassment of how naive I am about all this girly stuff. My dear friend and co worker  even paid ten extra bucks for my surgeon to take care of the corns on my pinkie toes which my surgeon carefully pointed out with her little scalpel after first looking at my hooves.

I tipped my surgeon an extra ten bucks, she certainly earned it.

We all piled back into my car laughing, with me shuffling behind in my flat redunkulous flip flops so as not to muss my now phenomenally looking tootsies and went to lunch together, with my equally awesome daughter paying for our meal.

Sometimes you need to step away from your frenetic life and treat yourself . Most excellent for me, I got treated!

I haven't had that much fun since doing something with my own sister who is also totally awesome.

My final point being that blessings usually and almost always exceed your misfortunes but sometimes tend to be easily overlooked when concentrating on the negative.

As Bob Dylan so eloquently put it...

It's been a struggle,  no joke. I also realize how very many people have watched us struggle and totally seen us through.

Our times ... my family's times, they are a changing and mostly because of love  from so many others.

Once again blessed and always grateful....

COTTON

Holy Freakin' Toledo!

I got home from work last night around ten and got busy in the house. Pay day was at midnight so got online and scheduled all the bills to be paid this morning. Finished the laundry and put my newly cleaned vacuum cleaner back together, looking brand spankin' new if I may say so myself!  Started to go upstairs and happened to look at the calendar on the kitchen wall.

Crap.

American Kidney Foundation was coming by for a pick up the next day and had to have all items out and marked by seven thirty AM.

Popped a Natty Light, grabbed three huge black trash bags from under the kitchen sink and trudged upstairs to my room with Ziggy in my way every step of the way. Hopped up onto my king size bed like the boss he is, circled three times and settled into a black doughnut on his side of the bed appearing to immediately be in REM sleep mode.

I opened our walk in closet and got to work. By one thirty I had filled all three bags, two boxes and gone back downstairs for one more trash bag. Here's the rule I used.

"If we hadn't worn it once in three years, it went in the bag."
 

I got rid of shoes bet Tim hasn't worn in over a decade and same for me. I still had tons of size seven clothes hanging on the racks (been wearing size one for at least six years) and tossed them in too. Got rid of the stupid steamer machine thingy that Tim bought about ten years ago (swearing we'd never have to iron again) and threw in every golf shirt with tattered collars and shorts with rips. I got rid of things I'd never even worn. I actually kept expecting to pull a pair of hip hugger bell bottoms with the three button fly off a hanger but just found enough skinny jeans to sew together to make a pair of bell bottoms for Mama Cass. All Tim's "Magnum PI" Hawaiian shirts went into the bags along with my redunkulous denim mini skirts.

By two AM was exhausted but couldn't believe how tidy our closet looked and even more impressed with how many plastic hangers we owned! We'll never have to buy another hanger unless someone comes up with another use for them.

I went back downstairs and got one last thirty gallon bag, filling it with all the empty Christmas boxes I always intend to use the next year but never do and empty shoe boxes which have no idea why we kept except must have been too lazy to take them downstairs and the closet was a lot closer.

Tied them all up, lined them along the wall and set my alarm for seven fifteen. I woke when the alarm went off, in a zombie state (Ziggy still in one) knowing you can hear when the donation truck pulls into our driveway. At eight I stumbled downstairs dragging bags behind me and piled them all on the front porch putting index cards on each declaring them "Donation Treasures."

Zach was up by nine after crashing the night before on the living room sofa during my upstairs purge right across the hall from his own room.

I had a buyer for his Tahoe which has been sitting in our driveway taking up an ungodly amount of space for almost a year. She was meeting us at one to purchase it and hopefully drive away my (and my  neighbors) eyesore. All we had to do was jump it off after sitting so long and put a new (used) rear tire on. I'd found one for sixty bucks a local tire store. The Tahoe has low profile tires with 22" chrome rims. The car wouldn't crank but Zach said all it needed was a charge and took it to Autozone. While that was charging he went to borrow a hydraulic jack from a buddy to take the flat tire off.

By this time  was ten thirty and were meeting the buyer at one. I told him to go get the jack and would go pick up the charged battery myself.

Of course I got to Autozone only to find the battery was kaput so bought the cheapest one they had after a quick call to Zach. Said he'd pay me for it (which he did) and lugged it home to find him jacking up my driveway eyesore.

Here's the thing we learned about 22" chrome rims. They have one lug nut which requires a special tool as an anti theft device. Did we have that special tool?

That'd be a negative, Ghost Rider.

We had thirty minutes left until this woman was going to meet us to buy this car.

I turned into Mavirick .

I told Zach to get my can of Fix a Flat out of the garage and shoot the tire up... drive it to the tire store, have the new/used tire put on and I would go meet the seller, have the woman follow me to the tire store and do the deal there.

Zach called the woman and told her the problem / complications and asked if she wanted to come another day instead?

Nope.

Seems she was really excited about buying our eyesore and wanted it today (which was fine by me).

Granted she was getting a great deal. Cosmetically not so great looking but engine ran strong, could sell the rims, make way over half her money back and with a little work probably last a few more years.

I wanted it gone too.

It appears I'd had too many flats this past summer on my Johnny Dear and wasn't enough left in the can to pump up the four inch wide tire.

Massey to the rescue! I sent her to the nearest gas station to buy us another can.Here's the thing my kids have always said about me, and is basically true.

"Our Momma can throw some crap together at the last minute!"

As they've gotten older, use a word other than crap but you still get the jist.

We were originally supposed to meet the buyer at the police dept; wasn't really sure who I was even meeting or if they were even who they said they were and kinda wary. Once she wholeheartedly agreed  was a great place to meet for the transaction and actually appreciated the idea, decided it was okay to simply have her come to my house. What's the worst she was gonna do...steal our bills off the kitchen counter when she used the restroom?

By this time was past time for me to leave for work but felt comfortable enough with the lady and her second driver to leave the rest in Massey and Zach's hands. They got the tire pumped up to the correct PSI and I took off for work, stopping by the credit union with her money order while they all headed to the tire place.

Check cleared.
Tahoe made it to Buck's Used tires.
I made it to work on time.
Buyer must have made the two hour drive back home because I never got a call.

Yep. I can throw some crap together when I have to.

Now  even have kids old enough to help me do it!

Got to work right on time and walked into another Sh*t Show (my next blog) but at least made over another Two Ben Fifty.

Came home from work and turned into our driveway a little before midnight, exhausted but smiling when seeing our driveway free and clear.

Feel like I'm almost to "Z" so going to bed to catch some.

Til next time...COTTON

It Truly Is A Wonderful Life

It's been a long and winding road, to coin a phrase.

I fell in love after he fell in love with me. It was wonderful and all sunshine for twenty five years. Then over five years ago it all fell apart.

It's been the longest five years of my life...probably seems like ten to him.

As I think back over the battles we fought, always together but sometimes mentally apart have learned one thing.

It's easy to point fingers. Been there done that. Didn't help. Never will.

This was us on our honeymoon in California , traveling up and down the coast. The year was 1990. Never in a million years would have thought we'd go through the past five (plus) years, but we did.

My biggest accomplishment is he hasn't killed me yet.

When a man takes excellent care of you and your family for over twenty years then suddenly fails through no fault of his own, it's tough to not point...and unfortunately I did.

But we're still together albeit still apart. He was  a thousand miles away for a year but now only  a seven hour drive away.

Finances are no longer a huge worry and is such a wonderful relief.

We have a lot of work ahead of us to get back that loving feeling but have faith we will.

Old school stuff means a lot to me and feel sorry for kids today growing up in a Kardashian world with no other exposure or true realization of what "Real" is. Thank goodness my kids have the parents they do.

They have seen it all these past few years and hope was a lesson they take to heart.

Life comes with no guarantee and simply get what you give.

Til next time...COTTON