Holiday get-togethers

I adore my job right now. I work at Zingerman's, finally. My job is to talk to people all day about fine olive oil, imported and domestic award-winning cheeses, specialty cured meats from humanely raised (as possible as that might be, at least) and slaughtered cattle and pigs, traditionally baked bread with no corners cut to maximize profits, traditional 200 year old balsamic vinegars, imported mustards, single-estate coffees, rare varietals of honey, and heirloom paella or risotto rices from Spain and Italy. My job is to remind people of the virtues found in food raised in traditional pre-Industrial methods, artisanally produced by hand with ingredients dug, grown, or plucked from the earth. My job is to taste all of these products and to offer tastes of all of these products to my guests. And I'm expected to treat these guests with honor and respect for their intelligence and taste, reminding them that they can actually taste the difference between food in which the Goddess has been respected and food in which the Goddess has not. (Not that I tell my guests using the word Goddess, but I do when I talk to my co-workers because they respect my Wiccan beliefs.) In the long term, I'll have five paid weeks a year off, more unpaid if I want them. They will pay me to take classes about specialty foods, or how to run a business, or even how to go about buying my first home. They'll give me a 401k, they'll possibly help me own my own business someday, and they'll give me raises based on how much I'm learning as long as I'm giving good service to the guests.

I adore my job.

There is one thing that I do not adore about my job, however. My best friends are scattered throughout the country. Three of my best friends, Ryan, Jennifer, and Gabrielle, are in Oregon. Nicole is in New York. And their children, Elijah, Xander, and Hannah are growing up without knowing how special they are to me (except perhaps Xander) and without me seeing them grow up. Annalisa will soon be in Texas. I do not adore that. My choice to have my career in retail food has limited my ability to take vacations during the traditional eating holidays of the year (Tofurky Day and Yule) because most employees are expected to work during those holidays.

I look forward strongly to the time they can all come to me. I want to show off my city to them. I've seen New York, and I love it, it vibrates with life. I've seen Salem, and though my love is not there for the city, it is there for the state--one of the most beautiful landscapes I've seen and certainly an important root of my paganism. I want them to see my new home. My beautiful Great Lakes, my beautiful arbored city, and my beautiful Zingerman's. I want them to taste with me, my Parmigiano-Reggiano, my Pasolivo olive oil, for Jennifer my pancetta, my apple-wood smoked bacon, for Annalisa a German sausage that earns the capital "G," for Ryan a taste of La Tur, for Gabrielle a wasabi chocolate and a perfect Papua New Guinea coffee, for Nicole some sourdough and a tour of the world of Solomon's passions (I want to show you my passion in its full splendor, talking as if I was drunk and kneeling before you, praising the food around me), for all the children, traditionally made gelato from milk of a local dairy farmer with one herd.

I feel as if I will be missing holidays with you for quite a while. And I'm sad about that.