Picture it – Sicily – 1987.
Wait a minute, wrong story, but we sure do miss you Sophia Petrillo and
your witty humor.
Take two! Picture it –
Biddeford, Maine – 1988. Like so many of
my classmates, I balanced homework, soccer, theatre and other extracurricular activities
with working evenings and weekends to save money for college. After a brief stint at a local restaurant
called the Dry Dock, I started worked part time at Wellby Super Drug, a subsidiary
of Hannaford Brothers and local drug store chain that operated primarily in
Maine and New Hampshire.
I have always believed that everyone needs to spend some
time in their life working in either retail or the food and service
industry. It’s hard work, often with
little pay, and makes you better appreciate the importance of both giving and acknowledging
good customer service, something that has become more and more rare in a
society more interested in social media and consumed with self-entitlement. But I digress.
During my time at Wellby, I met one of those people that
truly stand out in your life – you know - the kind of person that makes an indelible
impact on your sense of self and whom you look back upon with fondness and
admiration even though your paths no longer cross. Her name was Danielle, and she was the
manager at the Biddeford location – the largest volume store in the 41 retail
chain. She managed with humor and
kindness and had a genuine interest in the lives of her employees and the
majority of their time spent “not on the clock.” She was the kind of person who wanted to know
about your parents, how your classes were going, and particularly for the young
people that worked there, what was in store for their future. And perhaps most notably, she was willing to
take risks to give young people considerable responsibility when few others
would have been so inclined.
At 17 years old, she gave me the position of Shift
Leader: this position essentially
managed the team and operations when the manager or assistant manager were not
there – mostly in the evenings. At 17, I
had become the youngest shift-leader in the entire chain, and to her credit
several of my classmates earned the same title.
During my time as shift leader, the biggest lesson I learned
was how to manage people with respect – people who for the most part were often
much older than I was, a skill that would prove to be useful later in life in
politics. The friendships I made may not
have lasted a lifetime – as people come and go in this kind of business – but they
will stay with me forever. I most remember
Sharon - a woman who had never finished high school and finding herself later
in life with a family all grown up and with grandchildren - decided to take on
a part time job for something to do. We
talked a lot about not finishing high school and how she had wished she
had. I told her that it was never too
late to go back to school – and that’s just what she did! I could not have been more proud to watch
this incredible woman graduate from high school and receive her diploma! Those are the moments in life you never
forget.
Wellby Super Drug served as a backdrop for many important
things in my life – a job to help save for college, a location to perform my
Eagle Scout service project which was offering free fingerprinting for all
fourth graders in the Biddeford Public Schools and even a place for fundraisers
for various high school clubs. But even
in a French speaking community, it also served as a place to practice my Spanish
– in public – and with lots of laughs!
During my freshman year, Biddeford High School began a pilot
Spanish program. Before this time,
French and Latin were the only offerings in the Foreign Language Department. Biddeford is a Franco-American community and
so, the French program made a lot of sense.
Here’s the problem – I had a really hard time with pronunciation (we had
been required t to take some basic French in Junior High School so I knew what
was in store) and knowing that while French was an important part of the
culture of my local community, I believed Spanish would be more practical in
the long run.
Each night, about 10 minutes before Wellby Super Drug would
close – we would make an announcement over the intercom to alert customers to
bring their final purchases to the front of the store. Very proud of my newly learned Spanish – I decided
one night to do the announcement in both English and Spanish:
Attencion – Welby Super Drug será cerrar en diez
minutos. Por favor, trae sus compras al frente
a la tienda donde estaremos encantados de ayudarle. Muchas gracias and espero que tenga buena
noche.
Please note that I have cleaned this up a little for this
post – it was probably a lot rougher back then!
And by the way, you can download an app called Duolingo and learn a
language with 5 minutes of practice each day.
Well you should have seen the look on the faces of the older
French ladies shopping when this announcement came over the intercom. It was as if – “wait a minute, that’s not
French. I am so confused!” Fortunately, there was the English version as
well. This soon became a big hit at the
end of each night at Wellby Super Drug – at least to me it did! Coupled with these announcements and my
Halloween costume one year as a Mexican Ranchero, I came to be known as Pedro,
a nickname that would later be replaced years later with Mary! But that’s another story! Below is the real picture in the back room of
Wellby!
Danielle, the store manager, upon hearing of my new version
of the closing announcement brought me into her office later that week (I
thought I was going to be in trouble) and with a smile on her face proclaimed, “Peter,
you’re just you.” I have to admit I was
a little confused as to what she meant – but I proudly embraced her comment and
have throughout life often thought of that moment. I now know through and through, that yes I am
just me and I do indeed march to my own drummer. As the song goes, “I am my own special
creation.” But in reality, aren’t we
all?
More than 25 years later, I found myself retreating from
Washington. DC the Inaugural weekend in 2017.
I connected with a college roommate and one of my dearest Lourdes – who is
Cuban American and helped me practice my Spanish all during college. New and old friends alike went to see Kinky
Boots on Broadway – a story of a shoe factory, that in the wake of a declining
domestic shoe market, transforms itself into a supplier of boots for drag
queens!
I was struck by a moment in the show when the lead
character, Lola - a big ‘ol drag queen, challenges her working class nemesis Don
to a bet. Lola will fight Don in a
boxing match (little does he know her father was trained as a professional
boxer but she lets him win anyway) and he has to “accept someone for who they
truly are” – which turns out to be the heir son of the factory who is
desperately trying to save the jobs at the factory.
Thanks Lola for the reminder to accept someone for who they
truly are. And thank you Danielle for
instilling in me the courage to proclaim proudly “Peter – you are just you!”
