days in the life of a
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Wright Quad Cafeteria Memories
February 26, 2009
ALTER EGOS
During my college days at Wright Quad Cafeteria, I worked alongside several celebrities. In fact, I myself was a celebrity.
As I wrote in a previous post, one of the full-time employees Richard, was a huge film buff, and in his obsession with movies and movie stars he liked to rename people for movie stars he loved.
My friend Ralph was renamed Robert Redford. Redford was THE HOT MAN of movies back in the 1970s!
Ralph didn't mind.
My best friend Susie was Annette Funicello. She loved that comparison.
For those who have never heard of Annette Funicello, she was the most famous of the original Disney Mouseketeers, one of the most popular children's television shows in the 1950s. Because of this, Richard had a second name for Susie as well.
Minnie Mouse. She wasn't quite as crazy about that one.
When Susie and I stopped by the Wright Quad Dishroom to visit Richard a couple of years ago, Richard was thrilled to learn that Susie was married with two children and living near Hollywood, California. As Richard put it "Minnie Mouse married to Mickey Mouse, living in Hollywood with their two Mouseketeers."
The man never forgets!
And, of course, my favorite. The sultry, sexy, gorgeous, blonde-bombshell Mae West.
I can certainly see how Richard could confuse me with her. The resemblance is uncanny, wouldn't you agree?!
I loved being Mae West! I don't know if Richard even knows my real name.
But that's okay. Let him think what he wants!
As a sidenote...when I was looking for photos of Robert Redford, I was reminded of just how good-looking he was and is! Wow! Hunk Alert!!!
One of the reasons I married Kim is because he was a Robert Redford look-alike.
Talk about a Hunk Alert! Robert Redford...eat your heart out!!!
(images from google.com)
February 22, 2009
WRIGHT QUAD CAFETERIA
Heading off to Indiana University in the fall of 1975, I knew I needed to get a job.
The most obvious and convenient place to work was in the cafeteria in the dorm
where I lived, Wright Quad.
My own children have all worked at the Wright Quad food service, but things have
changed a lot. Back in my days at IU, each dorm had its own cafeteria where
the residents of that dorm ate. Wright Quad was one of the larger dorms,
preparing three meals every day for over 900 students. They needed lots of
workers, so I got a job. It paid the $2.30 minimum wage and they worked around
my class schedule. It was the perfect job for me!
I have some very fond memories of my days in Wright Cafeteria. I learned how to
clock in, working the system by clocking in 6 minutes early and clocking out 6
minutes after my shift to get an extra 46 cents every day. We were told to wear
jeans and closed-toe shoes and a hairnet over our hair, and we had these adorable
red and white checked jackets to wear while we worked.
I did many different jobs in the 4 years I worked there, but my favorite was
serving breakfast. I was an early riser anyway, and it was a slower, more
relaxed pace than the dinner meal. We had full-time cooks that did the actual
cooking, and we would help some but mostly work the serving line. I enjoyed
talking with the students, my shift went quickly, and then I had the rest of the day
for other things...like classes, studying...fun things like that!
My best friends from college are those I worked with in thecafeteria. The middle gal in the photo is my closest collegefriend. Susie and I were roommates for two years and I wasa bridesmaid in her wedding. She now lives the rich life inLos Angeles, with maids and gardeners and pool people andothers in an area where celebrities live. She's a long way from our dorm in Bloomington, Indiana! But we still keep intouch regularly, with email and phone calls and the occasional visit when we can work it out. Even when wewere in school, Susie was so much more worldly than I and taught me about things I didn't even know existed! She had gay male friends that wore fingernail polish (I had neverheard of such a thing!) and had the risque book, The Joy of Sex, on her bookshelf. We were (and still are!) total opposites in so many respects, yet I loved her...and still do! The full-time employees were interesting characters, as well. One lady named
Jan worked breakfast with me and she kept inviting me to attend a church service
with her. I finally agreed, thinking how bad could it be? I mean, I was raised in
church so I knew (or thought I knew!) what I was in for. Jan picked me up one
evening during their Revival Week and drove me out in the country to a tiny
Pentecostal church that was filled with people. As the service went on...and on
and on...the crowd became more animated and even frenzied, speaking in tongues,
running around the church, rolling in the aisles. I had never seen such a thing and
sat frozen in horror in my pew! When the service climaxed with an altar call,
I was the only person who wasn't convulsing around the altar. I quickly grabbed
my purse and high-tailed it out of the sanctuary, with the minister screaming at
me the whole way that I would burn in hell!!! I sobbed in Jan's car, having no idea
where in the world I was and no way to get home, and eventually she emerged
smiling as if nothing out-of-the-ordinary had just happened. If I hadn't already been
a Christian, that experience would have kept me away from religion for the rest of
my life. Most of what I learned in college did not come from classes and books!
And there was Richard, an unforgettablecharacter! Richard ran the dishroomand I worked with him often. Studentsate off real dishes and silverware, andRichard was responsible for running allof them through his huge dishwasher,that he named Ethel. When people finished eating, they put their trays filledwith their dirty dishes on a conveyor belt that came into the dishroom. We would take them off, scrape off food, and load Ethel. Ethel rancontinuously, so it was a challenge to keep loading the dirty dishes and unloading the clean ones on the other side. You might think it was yucky,boring work, but Richard made it fun. He always had a monologue going,singing and chattering away, sometimes to us but often just to himself. Once in awhile, we'd get behind or something wouldn't go quite right andRichard would go on a rampage, yelling and even shaking his fist at Ethel.Occasionally he'd get in trouble with the boss-lady (who he hated!), but wewere all very protective of Richard and took the blame whenever possible.Richard lived in his own world and we all appreciated him for who he was.Richard still works in what is now Wright Quad Food Court, and my ownchildren have all worked with him, still running a newer version of Ethel. Gotta love Richard!Life lessons from Wright Quad cafeteria have followed me these past 30 years. It opened doors for friendships and
experiences I never would have had. It reinforced what I already knew about responsibility, loyalty, and the challenges
of working with people. And a little extra spending money was just a bonus!
me working at Wright Quad cafeteria
December 1976
What in the world am I dipping?
"Pastry Girls" Cathy, Susie, and me
January 1977
Some things just never change...I still love pastry!
Jan on her birthday
November 1978
the one and only Richard
January 1979
Susie lovin' the brownies!
December 1976
February 22, 2009
RICHARD
In the course of one's life, every once in awhile you cross paths with a unique person that is unforgettable in his own special way. However brief and casual your relationship may be, he makes a lasting impression on you.
Richard is one of those people.
I first met Richard when he was a young man, early 20s I would guess, working as a full-time employee at the Wright Quad cafeteria at Indiana University in the fall of 1975. My very first shift, I worked alongside Richard in his Dishroom.
I say "his Dishroom" because that's exactly what it was. It was his domain. Richard was in charge of washing all the plates, flatware, glasses (those were the days when people ate off real plates!), and all the pots and pans that feeding daily meals to 900 students generates. It was a big job and, however menial it may seem, an important job. Richard took great pride in his Dishroom.
The centerpiece of the Dishroom was a huge commercial dishwasher that Richard fondly named Ethel. Ethel ran continuously, slowly rotating dirty dishes through one side and sending them out clean on the other. It was our job to scrape off the food and stack the dirty dishes for Richard to load. He was very particular about how they were to be loaded into Ethel, and he liked to do it himself to assure it was done correctly. Eventually, Richard allowed me and a few others to load Ethel if he felt sure we would do it right. We worked hard to prove ourselves to Richard!
That in itself is ironic. You see, Richard would never be college material. I know he did attend high school in Bloomington with my brother-in-law, but I don't know if he graduated. And if he did, it would certainly be with special waivers or circumstances. Richard lives with the special challenge of having a child-like mind trapped in a man's body. His world is different than our world, and he sees things in a whole different light. Professional educators would have labels to describe the way Richard operates.
I label him as "special."
Richard lives with his mother (although I've never met her, I can only imagine the patience she must have!). He doesn't drive, but rides his bicycle to work every day, no matter what the weather.
He's always been a huge movie buff. While I was at IU, he used all his free money to buy movies on the big film reels, like the ones theaters showed. He had a huge collection then! Since then, Richard has collected movies on VHS and now DVDs. He may have one of the largest private movie collections in the world, for all I know. Whenever a movie is released, he's always the first to buy it and tell the world about his newest addition. He spends countless hours watching and rewatching movies for hours upon end, content in his own Truman-like universe.
Because of his passion for all things movie-related, he recreates his world around that.
He sees people he works with as alter-egos of movie stars, and often names them accordingly. When he met me, he immediately renamed me "Mae West," one of the
old Hollywood movie stars who was considered very beautiful and quite sexy! Now, I will assure you, I was neither...but in Richard's eyes I became Mae West. And he still, to this day, calls me Mae West when I see him.
How can I not adore a man who thinks I'm Mae West?!
I worked with Richard for 4 years, often not actually in the Dishroom, but when I worked the same shift as Richard I saw him a lot. Then in 1979 I graduated, got a job, said good-bye to Richard and the gang, left Bloomington, and that was that.
Or so I thought.
Fast-forward to the fall of 2001, when Kristoffer started college at IU. He got a job in what is now Wright Food Court. When he came home one weekend, he began to tell us about this crazy, entertaining fellow he worked with there.
His name was Richard. Yes, the very same!
For nearly 40 years now, Richard has worked at the same job in the same place, running the Wright Quad Dishroom. A lot of things have changed at Wright over those
40 years. But one constant remains...Richard.
When I found out Richard was still there, I called my college roomie Susie in LA to tell her. I knew she'd be tickled to hear about Richard after all these years.
Susie cried. Tears about sweet memories and a special man who had made our lives at IU a little more fun. Tears of amazement that this extraordinarily challenged man had found a niche in our society, was gainfully employed and self-supporting in a thankless job when many people would have tossed him aside without a second glance. Tears of appreciation for the faithful employee he had been in a time where loyalty is rare.
And I am so thrilled that all four of my children and both my daughter-in-law and son-in-law have had the privilege to know and work with Richard. Zach will forever be "Captain America" to Richard, and Emily went from Mae West's daughter to "Mrs. America" when she married Zach. The boys are Mae West's sons, but I think Richard does call Kamaron "Camel" (a mispronunciation that stuck!) and Kyler "Kite" (a long story...).
Oh...one more thing I just love about Richard! He's so un-politically correct and calls everything just as he sees it. Most of us have a culturally-shaped filtering system that influences what we say and do. Not Richard. He's so out there, and the thing is...he gets by with it because...well, because he's Richard and he doesn't know any better!
Every black man that works at Wright he proudly calls Eddie Murphy and every Asian man is Jackie Chan. He doesn't mean that in a derogatory way at all...he loves both Eddie Murphy and Jackie Chan! He is so raw and brutally honest in his perceptions of the world, a rare thing to see in our extremely sensitive/careful American culture, where we tiptoe around making sure than we even unintentionally offend no one.
Maybe the world could use a lot more Richards in it.
But...then again...there's only ONE! He's a true original and I'm blessed to have crossed paths with him. Twice. How often does that happen?
As Mae West once said, "You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough."
I'd say that Richard is living up to his potential, making the most of what God gave him!
my special friend, Richard...in 1979 and 30 years later in 2009
