Moving On

Well, it's over.

We tried contacting coffee boss Mandy to work things out.

We waited and waited and waited.

No response.

And then we were taken off admin on the Facebook page.

We figured this was her way of telling us she was done and that she didn't want to talk to us anymore, so we started to move on with our lives.

Mona was offered a full time promotion at her other job, working the hours she normally worked at the coffee shop, and she took it. I started looking for another part time job and put my applications in a few places.

I was having way too much fun looking on Craigslist. I could shave my head for $500 dollars, be a part of a local gang like movie (there was lots of drinking and swearing in the promo video), or become someone's sugar baby.

While all of those sounded appealing, the one that really caught my attention was a person looking for someone to write a screenplay about their life. How fun would that be? I love writing and it sounded so intriguing, how could I not respond? So I did. (I am still waiting to hear back)

Mom was yelling at me about looking for jobs on Craigslist, especially with the ones I was suggesting as good jobs. She was going on about the Craigslist Killer and how I shouldn't even be looking for jobs on there or responding to ads. She thought I was going to be killed, just by sending an email.

Craigslist people can be nice! I once watched a documentary where a guy lived for a month just off of Craigslist and the kindness of people he met through it. He had no money or contact with anyone he knew. He even found his camera man through Craigslist. The way people were willing to connect and help this guy was amazing. He only spent one night without someplace to stay. I loved it and thought for awhile about giving it a try, but I would be killed by Mom before the Craigslist Killer could ever get to me, so I didn't. If you want to watch it was on Netflix and called Craigslist Joe. Mona, of course, hated listening to me talk about it, but you might like it.

Mandy, the coffee boss, did end up responding eventually, but by then it was too late, we had already moved on. Mona really wanted to send her the video of the song Gotta Go My Own Way from High School Musical. She said the lyrics fit perfectly with what she was feeling:

But, Mona didn't think Mandy would appreciate it much, so she just went with "We didn't hear from you and we moved on"

Mandy had lots of excuses for everything and made everything seem like Mona's fault. She ended by saying it was for the best that we didn't come back.

So this part of our coffee shop journey has come to a close, but that doesn't stop us from moving forward.

Eventually we will have our own coffee shop.

Integrity

Thank you guys. For listening to my vague problems and letting me vent about everything that has been going on with the coffee shop and for taking the time to be apart of my life by offering such great support for Mona and I.

After countless hours of Mona and I talking about what to do with Mandy, we have decided to go forward with the coffee shop at this point in time with a reevaluation come January. 

We made a promise to Mandy to help her open downtown. Even though she has not treated us the best over the last two months, that does not void us of our promise. 
If she chooses not to keep us or schedule us hours, that will be on her. 
And, on top of not breaking our promise, ditching her right now could be detrimental to our reputation in the community and might hurt our chances of having a successful business down the road.

You may think us idiots for sticking it out any longer, and I may be with you on that, but it's more than just about Mandy, it's about our integrity.

in·teg·ri·ty

noun

1. 1.

   the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles; moral uprightness.

   "he is known to be a man of integrity"

   synonyms:

   honesty, probity, rectitude, honor, good character, principle(s), ethics, morals, righteousness, morality, virtue, decency, fairness,scrupulousness, sincerity, truthfulness,  trustworthiness

We want to have strong morals and be fair and decent and trustworthy. And to do that sometimes it means doing the thing you want to do the least. In this case staying true to our word and not throwing Mandy out to the wolves. 

And even though we are staying things will be different. She has lost our trust completely and we will be watching her more closely. And If things still seem bad, come January, we will gracefully make our exit.

Another thing with Mona and I love is...we love the coffee business. We love making coffee and most importantly we love the customers who come in for coffee. They are like our family.  

We can't, financially, open our own coffee shop yet, so this is as close as we can get to the business for the time being.

Now we just have to see if Mandy still wants us around or not. If not then it's out of our hands.