Me The Lunch Lady

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This summer I have a job at a Christian summer camp working in the kitchen, so essentially, I'm a lunch lady. The camp is for kids and teens, my job on most days is to serve them breakfast and lunch as well as to vacuum after they leave for both meals.

Serving is my favorite for a lot of reasons. There is a rhythm to it. There are several dishes on a line with someone to serve each of them. One server grabs a tray and relays it off to the next server until a serving of all the dishes are on the tray. The server at the end of the relay hands the tray to a hungry camper and seven out of ten times gets thanked.

If the rhythm gets disrupted everyone is off their game. A dish runs out and we need to get another tray out of the warmer or a camper asks for more of this dish but definitely none of that dish; the rhythm is suspended.  Because of this we actually have to put thought into "one serving of corn on tray, corn on tray, two servings of corn on tray, one serving of corn on tray, corn on tray, corn on tray" until the blissful rhythm is restored.

Campers come by the hundreds. Last week there were more than four-hundred campers and after second servings there were more than six hundred trays that had to be washed. Most groups of campers only stay for a week or so but you start to remember faces. Maybe it's the little girl who had a bright smile or that vegetarian kid who only asks for a tray and helps himself to the self serve salad trays we set out.

The vacuuming is less pleasant than other tasks but it has gotten easier. I've learned that my apron (which I wash often, may I note) is the perfect place to store little items that can't be vacuumed such as used, abandoned napkins and empty ketchup and mustard packets left behind by the campers. I love shredded cheese, but not when it's on the floor. It has been trampled upon which means it is already stuck in the carpet. Sometimes it takes a couple days worth of vacuum sessions to finally get the yellow out of the dark brown carpet.

Of course I do other odd jobs like rotating the stock which consists of checking that we have everything that we ordered when a new shipment comes in and putting those new items under the old stock so the older food gets used first. The only bad thing about rotating stock is how cold the industrial freezers can get. On a totally unrelated note I really need to start bringing my winter coat to work.

When I first arrived I was very surprised at how clean the kitchen is and how great the food is. All the tables are wiped down and then sanitized. The dishes are all scrubbed and then put in the dishwasher. None of the dishes are hand dried but put on a rack to dry instead. The silverware is sprayed and put through the dishwasher twice. The floors are swept and mopped daily.

Even though most of the food is frozen, so much goes into the preparation and so much is added to it; you would never guess it came out of a freezer. I get a lunch break everyday and eat what I serve, I can honestly say I love every meal I have eaten from camp. I'm getting more and more comfortable with the people I work with, all of them are older than me but it doesn't matter because we all follow the same orders from the head chefs. The head chefs are the best too, God knows they have been so patient with my distracted newbie self. Two of the girls who work with me go on mission trips, one of them is currently going to seminary.

God obviously knows what He is doing. I'm in such a godly and spiritually nurturing work environment. There is such an age different between the kitchen staff. From teenagers to women who have been working since the camp started many decades ago, and we all treat each other like family.

The Lord works in mysterious ways, and because of that, I am working as a lunch lady—and loving it.