I had to work tonight, which although this post will date itself the 26th, it is still the 25th to me. Working 4p to 12:30a on Christmas. And while I choose at this point for Christmas to be pretty much like any another day to me, I cannot help but be in the midst of everyone else's holiday. I had more than my usual number of text exchanges before I went to work.
One such exchange was with Kathleen. She asked me if the money would be good, if I was still working at the Rubber Ducky Place. That made me laugh out loud. Everyone who knows about my currents source of income knows about the ducks! From now on I will be calling it just that. The Rubber Ducky Place. It is such a bizarre job. It has this intimate, mostly regulars feel, and some of my customers call it Cheers, because I bother to remember their name and what they drink and smoke. Has it not occurred to them that Cheers was really a bar full of addicts who had no life without the drink? Or that my reason for being there is to take their money, like Sam and Carla? My hope being if they like me and the service they receive, that they will rejoice in giving me more money. I keep a firm line in the sand and I do not socialize with customers, ever. There are many I genuinely like, and a select few that I might hang out with were they not my customers, who drink and gamble for fun. But, honestly, I am not looking to make any friends, only money.
Holidays can go either way financially, I cleaned up on Thanksgiving this year. I've tracked my income for my entire tenure and this is my 5th Christmas. Tonight it was painfully slow. I was on the cranky side internally. First I forgot my phone charger, dammit! Jim!, if I can play games and go online, at least I have something to do. My phone will not sustain 8 hours of constant use without juice. Second, if I'm not making money, the Rubber Ducky Place is horrific. And on Christmas, my favorite customers, the ones who play big, hit large and share, are home with their families. What's left is the lowest level of player, the pathetic ones, who play the minimum lose the paltry amount of money they brought in, then go outside to scape up a dollar in change from the floor of their car, if they have one.
The store I currently work in is far south and not easily accessible even by bus, I so no longer have many customers who don't have a car or at least access to one. I clung to the gratitude of that tonight. I spent the two prior Christmas' in a store in just about the worst part of town, where the pathetic ones out numbered the good ones by a lot, and it was a good shift if I didn't have to kick someone out.
This Christmas, in my new store, I hung all the decorations and trimmed the fake tree the day after Thanksgiving. I had to go to the dollar store and purchase a cheap felt skirt to go around the bottom of the tree, so I did not have to look at the metal stand. I've done this every year at every store I've worked in even though I did not do the actual decorating. Certain things about Christmas have to be right, a skirt on the bottom of the tree is one of them.
The Rubber Ducky Place is a ridiculous job. I am amused at the work and the fact that I am doing it, yet, I know there is no better money to be made in Reno with my skill set. This is an in the meantime space and time, and I am so grateful I can afford to live and on my own time, I am completely unplugged from it. And now the gift of calling it the Rubber Ducky Place is one more tool to remind myself of the absurdity of it all and not let the bad guys get me down. Thanks, Kathleen! I love you.
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