Closing Thoughts

There is a lot of prep work that goes on before a restaurant can open for business every day. Likewise, there is a lot of clean up that has to be done once it closes. Usually, I worked the opening shift...and at the Oyster Bar, that meant that I got to restock the oyster crackers, bake off the rolls, bake the pies, cut the lemons, peel the shrimp, roll the silverware, ice the glasses and set up the waitress stations with cream, butter, coffee etc. For a while I was picking up the closing shift once a week...mostly because it gave me a chance to work with my best friend Mary. Closing side work involved putting away the leftover butter, cream and lemons. Filling the catsup bottles, rolling more silverware, cleaning out the waitress stations, washing the tables and sweeping the floors. It would take about an hour for the two of us to get everything done. Although some of it could be started before the restaurant actually closed...it was better to do the sweeping once all of our guests had left the dining room. I didn't really mind any of the side work...it gave Mary and I a chance to chat uninterrupted. One night as I was sweeping, I began thinking about my life. I had been a single mom for many years, divorced twice and not dating. It was not the way I had intended my life to turn out. I wanted to be married, have kids...and live happily ever after. Why couldn't I have that? Should I even try to find a life mate again? Would it be "third time's a charm" or "three strikes you're out?" I asked Mary why couldn't I have the June Cleaver life. She shrugged it off saying, "Because that was a TV show. They were not real people. They were actors reading scripts." I thought about that a bit and decided, no...the reason I wasn't living the June Cleaver life...is because I didn't marry Ward! I married the first time when I had just turned twenty. We had dated about five years. He was a very serious guy, loved to hike, fish, read and was organic in all ways before it was a popular way to live. Mary affectionately nick-named him my "communist hippie vegetarian husband." (Nothing like Ward Cleaver.) We divorced after about a year and a half. When I married the second time, it was to someone completely different. We partied a lot, went to rock concerts and had a lot of fun...at first. About four years into the marriage, drug abuse became a huge problem for my husband. Although he got clean and sober a couple of years later...it was a short lived sobriety. Drug abuse and unemployment were chronic issues for him. (Again...nothing like Ward Cleaver.) My "aha!" moment was when I realized: To live the June Cleaver life...you've got to marry Ward! So simple.
Later that night I was wondering, why so often, people have such a hard time admitting when they are wrong about something...take the consequences...and then move on with their life? Isn't that way better than denying...for the sake of pride...that they were wrong? That's when I came up with my second "quote for life": It's better to swallow your pride...than choke on it.
Again...so simple.
When I shared that thought with Mary, she asked what had gotten into me. I guess I was on a roll that night. Wisdom was simply oozing out of me. Sorry to say...it was a one time thing. But...at least I did have that one time!
Oh...years later, I DID remarry...and the answer to my question is "The third time's a charm!"