Context Matters

Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work. – Thomas Edison

When I turned five, my Mom bought me a birthday cake. Double stacked, creamy white icing with a brown teddy bear holding a “Happy Birthday” banner across her chest. All evening, I tried to sneak a taste. All my efforts were thwarted as she whacked my hands and told me to wait until after dinner. What felt like an entire week passed, and finally we cleared the plates and went back to the sideboard to officially sing and cut the cake. Only now, the gorgeous confection was a puddle on the counter, oozing off the dish. The teddy bear sagged, cracked in half down the middle. Suddenly, in a flash, what should have been obvious became crushingly clear. It was a cake from Dairy Queen, solid ice cream all the way through. Well, not so solid anymore, more liquid goo dripping steadily onto the carpet.  

Mom’s grudge against Dairy Queen started that day in our dining room. Slowly, her anger intensified, rising in degrees as I rose in grades through early elementary school. She erupted in a rage one muggy day in late August. Dairy Queen was the only drive-thru restaurant in town and a supporter of the “Eager Reader” school reading program. For every twenty-five books read, the student would be given a choice of a fancy pencil eraser or an ice-cream cone coupon. I loved to read almost as much as I loved ice cream. I collected a stack of those coupons as thick as a slice of bread. That afternoon, Mom pulled into the parking lot and instructed me to run inside and cash in two coupons for two cones: one chocolate for her and vanilla for me. She’d wait for me in the car, keeping the air conditioning running. 

I’m ecstatic, already humming with the sugary sweet goodness of anticipation.  I am also eight, extremely soft-spoken, undersized, and painfully, terribly, shy. I’ve never purchased my own ice cream cone before. I’ve never gone alone into any store before this point.  I hefted open the heavy glass door, and saw there were three lines, leading to three registers. Behind each register stands a bored-looking teenager punching keys, mixing blizzards, and stacking food on trays.

The ketchup, grease, and syrupy smells of the building make me a little dizzy. Does it matter which line? What do I say exactly? I don’t know where to go, and no one has noticed me, so I stand frozen in place unsure of my next move.  I deliberate and wait. I notice the clock, count out the seconds as the hand tick-tock its circular path around the circle. Other patrons pick up their trays, fill their fountain drinks, finish their meals, and dump the leftovers into the bins beside me. 

Finally, Mom walks through the door. She looks at me and quickly ascertains that I have not gotten further than five steps into the building in the last thirty minutes. I can see her frustration, and anger; she is exasperated and annoyed. Mom is full of surprises, she marches straight up to the counter, cuts the line, and asks the first employee she encounters why exactly they have been ignoring her daughter? How dare they leave me standing there for so long? She’s furious, and I see the crowd slowly inching away from her.  An adult, who later I would learn was the store Owner, quickly appeared at the counter to investigate the commotion. Apologizing profusely, while expertly making our cones (two in one hand!), he tells Mom to keep the coupons for next time.

Two things can be true at once. At that moment, I was grateful that Mom saw past her grudge and came into the restaurant. Otherwise, we may still be standing there.  I was also beyond embarrassed of the scene we had caused. Mom’s reaction was disproportionate to the issue and the owner’s mitigation placating. I felt small and invisible until my Mom came on the scene like a full-grown grizzly mamma-bear. There must be a better way to get an ice cream cone.

Years later, when I turned fourteen, I knew that I needed a job. A job meant a paycheck, and eventually a car, which would get me out of the business of bumming rides and tagging along to school events. It would put me into the driver’s seat of my life.

Babysitting gigs were sporadic, and frankly I wasn’t very good at “playing” with my little charges.  I tried detasseling corn, which I had heard paid well, but the conditions were brutal. I spent a week walking along in front of the tractor, or riding in the bucket, grabbing and snapping the corn tassels off the stalks as they passed by. At the end of the week, all I had to show for it was an intense sunburn and a paltry paycheck. I picked up a paper route, walking to the office after school and collecting a giant stack of newsprint pages to fold or roll and then deposit one by one into each customer’s mailbox. This was good, but not good enough. At this rate I wouldn’t be able to afford a car until I was thirty. I swallowed my embarrassment and applied for a position at Dairy Queen.

I don’t know if Steve Mitchel, the franchise Owner, remembered me when I walked in for the interview.  It wasn’t a very big town.  Time had passed; I was taller with my hair cut shorter. If he did, he was kind enough not to mention my Mom’s outburst all those years ago. We sat together in the front booth, the one with a window view of the parking lot to one side and the entire dining room opened to the other. He asked questions about school, my extracurricular activities and why I wanted to work at Dairy Queen. I tried to be honest. There weren’t many options to pick from.  Even though rationally I knew that my Mom’s grudge was ridiculous, my cheeks flushed with embarrassment, and I struggled to look him in the eye as I spoke. He hired me that afternoon.

Mom was not exactly pleased when I told her the news. “Why there of all places?” she asked, “Couldn’t you go anywhere else?”  At this point, my mind was made up and I was determined. They had given me a uniform, an itchy shirt and visor. Steve label-printed my name onto a plastic tag and I was scheduled to start mixing Blizzards the very next day. I would work there for the next three years, clocking in and clocking out, collecting paychecks that I saved away for my car and college. That whole time, Mom rarely stepped foot in the building, once dropping off dinner leftovers when I finally tired of the chicken strip baskets. 

At the time, I wouldn’t have called this work fun.  Fast food employment, like many service-based jobs, is packed full of gross tasks, unhappy customers, and low pay. But for this high-school kid seeking independence, Dairy Queen was a true gift. It was physical work, you were on your feet the entire shift, carrying heavy gallons of soft-serve ice cream mix or running trays of food out to waiting families. It could be scorching hot in the kitchen or bitter cold in the freezers. On the front line, you were assigned one of the three front registers or to the drive-through, where you punched in orders and then rushed to fill drinks, build sundaes, or carefully pack burgers and fries into take-away bags.

If you memorized the menu, weights, and price list you could earn more and be promoted to crew leader. Every day and shift required cleaning duties to be squeezed in between hand-dipping dilly bars and wiping down the endless stream of trays returned from the dining room. “If you have time to lean, you have time to clean!” Steve would remind us, as he made rounds through the building, chatting with customers and checking on the team. 

My typical schedule included Friday evening, Saturday morning and Sunday evening. Our location was special because we still served breakfast with actual waitresses. Every other time of day, you placed your order at the counter and then waited for someone to holler out your number or deliver your tray of food. But on the morning shifts, the sweet old lady waitresses would come to your table, diner style, and serve up eggs how you like them hot off the griddle. I learned to construct banana splits, peanut butter parfaits, milkshakes, malts, Frosties and brownie sundaes. Sometimes, I would decorate the ice cream cakes, writing “Happy Birthday” in swirling script across another child’s Teddy Bear banner.

Saturday morning was my favorite shift. It’s early, but I arrive after the main crew has already unlocked the doors and prepared the kitchen.  They are heating the grease in the fryer and stocking the plasticware. I walk-in through the back door, employee entrance, and instead of heading up front to take up residence by a register, I go straight back to the giant stainless-steel sinks and roll up my sleeves. On Saturday mornings, I wash dishes. The radio is playing Casey Kasem’s weekly countdown, and my hands are plunged deep into steaming hot, soapy water.

There are three steps: rinse, scrub, and rinse again. Steve is sitting in a small office to my left, door open, reviewing the books for the week and singing along to the top hits. The bus boy or the servers bring me tote after tote of breakfast plates, coffee mugs and silverware, everything a little sticky from the jelly and syrup remnants. I’m being useful, in a tangible and specific sort of way; rinsing, scrubbing, stacking, drying and putting away the dishes for the next round of customers.    

We grumbled of course, that’s what high-school kids do.  But in hindsight, I learned how a real job works at Dairy Queen. You show up when you are expected, clock in and do the tasks assigned while trying to have some fun. You don’t sneak handfuls of the cookie-dough crumbles.  You trade shifts and cover for friends when they have a date. If you see something that needs done, a table wiped off or the bathrooms cleaned, there’s no reason to wait for the Boss to ask, you pick up the towel and you do it.  I made every Blizzard I could upside-down-right good. I learned to work with and beside people who were different from me, classmates, and grown-ups. All of us were there trying to earn a paycheck for our own specific dreams. I learned how to serve others with a smile even when I was exhausted.

While serving ice cream cones and cheeseburgers at Dairy Queen, I was slowly absorbing another skill: leadership without direct authority. Steve was the Owner. He was the ultimate arbiter of disagreements, the final decision maker. He rarely left the building. There were also two shift Managers, other trusted and responsible adults who were allowed to balance the cash registers and transfer cash to the bank at the end of the day. The three grown-ups worked on a rotation, pitching in during busy times and ensuring the unruly teenage employees served edible food. I memorized the menu, applied, and was promoted to Crew Leader. This entailed serving as a general role model for the rest of the crew, demonstrating through actions the desired service behaviors. We were influencers before there were such things as Instagram and TikTok. We were expected to model pleasant, calm, efficiency, cleanliness, and discipline. 

I aspired to be a Crew Leader because it came with a wage bump, but I took a lot more than a few pennies an hour away from the experience. This was a position of influence among my peers; classmates who were cooler than I was. At first, I worried, would anyone take me seriously? How would they react to my oversight? Could I be more than just a lackey for the Boss? At first, I was much too soft spoken. My requests were ignored. Quickly, I over-corrected and became much too stern, too bossy. For a moment, this behavior garnered me the very unfortunate, and unflattering, nickname of “Missolini.”  That’s right, my name was being mashed up with the infamous Italian dictator.   Not a great look. 

In time, though, and with practice, I found the sweet spot. I learned to be direct, but kind, when asking another teammate to do something. I could be exacting, but reasonable, in my expectations. I could let go of the pet-peeves that didn’t really matter, but hold fast to my values of service, dependability and honesty.  I learned to put chips in the bank by helping others at every opportunity, so that they would be more likely to help me in my times of need. I learned to explain the “why” behind a task, versus expecting blind fidelity.

This work ethic and these communication skills are as valuable today in my office as they were thirty years ago in that restaurant. If we work together, big tasks become small. I can hold my team to a high standard or service delivery, but also provide grace and flexibility in matters of style and preferences. We can have difficult conversations, debate thorny problems, disagree strongly, negotiate, and resolve our differences. Then we can all go out for ice cream afterwards.

#Service