Enthusiasm

[gordonzola]

"How do you get to be the cheese buyer here."

He is a late 40s white guy, non-descript except for slightly crazy eyes. He is excited about the cheese. He is talking to my co-worker, Garage Rockstar. "You have to get a job here," she replies. "But of course he'd have to quit first."

We've just gone through a week of the food show where lots of grocery folks from all over the country were in town, looking over the store, taking pictures, digging for info etc. Is he a leftover from the show? Someone with experience who actually is looking for work? Someone who's using cheese a medium for their mania?

"I might just have to take a contract out on him. Would that be ok?"

"Well, that's up to you, I guess," Garage replies. She laughs. I laugh. It's the humor of relief, knowing that we don't need to worry anymore what we say to him. It's not codified, but when someone crosses that kind of line, anything goes.

He saw it in our faces. The customers can sense it really, even many of the crazy ones. Not that they've gone too far, but that our retail worker tone has changed. We're ready to go on the offensive.

"Do you know anything about cheese?" I ask. Garage stops work to watch him. He seems suddenly antsy.

"Well, I'm trying to learn. How do you find these cheeses? You do such a good job." Awesome, Now he's trying to suck up to us.

"Sales reps, trade shows, the annual cheese conference…"

"Oooh, there's an annual conference? Can anyone go?" Crazy Eyes asks.

"It's mostly trade, but you can go as an enthusiast," I reply.

"How do I prove my enthusiasm? "

"You write an enthusiastic check," I answer.

Comments

[flipzagging.livejournal.com]

Just curious -- what proportion of that was learning stuff you use every day, and what proportion was about pleasing the guardians of the system so you could call yourself a Real Therapist?

[elusis.livejournal.com]

"And have you stopped beating your wife yet? Answer yes or no."

I note that "learning things I didn't already know that are fairly specialized and specific knowledges" is not an option there.

[flipzagging.livejournal.com]

I didn't mean that in a hostile way. I thought it was a common experience that a lot of academic work was unrelated to what one did day in and day out.

I had a roommate who was an elementary school teacher, and as you may know you have to jump through many hoops to get schools to like you. It seemed like half his time was spent catching up with trendy pedagogical theories to please school officials. That was his assessment, by the way.

And I used to think I was going into sound design, and our professors made us learn how to splice audiotape (circa 1995). Even though *everyone* agreed these machines were soon to be museum pieces.

But you have a point, my question did place things in too stark and utilitarian terms, so I apologize.