Our last summer vacation of youth is a sweet thing. It comes between Junior and Senior year in high school. College is starting to have definable features, but there is still fun to be had before the rest of our life rips us out of adolescence.
I had just been given my first car and mom saw the convergence of mobility, means and motivation as a perfect storm of trouble for me. She had a plan….
Coming home from school one day, I sat enjoying dinner in that stool on the right. Mom came over and sat on the other one. “I’ve been thinking,” she began. “If we opened the restaurant 24 hours a day this summer, we could make this a big summer.” Made sense, I agreed. “What I need, though, is someone I can trust to run the place when I’m not here,” she added, springing the trap. A cold chill ran up my spine as I learned how I’d spend that summer working 11pm-to-7am six nights a week running Grandma’s Kitchen. Turned out to be a grow-up experience that taught me lessons I still use to this day. Thanks, Mom.