Shame

You guys, I have a confession to make.  This isn't something I'm proud of, but I was once an employee of McDonald's.  Not only was I an employee, I was an employee who worked only two weeks before being fired. 
It was the summer after grade 10, and I had decided that I needed to get a part time job.  I'm not sure why I chose McDonald's as my first place of employ, as I don't like their food, nor their starched-within-an-inch-of-their-life uniforms, not to mention the smell of the establishment itself, but I didn't apply anywhere else that summer.  I know not why I didn't look for a place that aligned with my interests a bit more, somewhere like the bookstore or the tea café I later worked at, but maybe I thought I had to start small and work my way up.  Little did I know I wouldn't be able to list McDonald's on my resumé after the disaster that ensued.  
It was my second week of work, and while I had grown fond of pouring free coffee refills for the seniors who arrived between six and eight am, I could not feel the same way about my visor and pleated pants.  Other than that small fashion faux pas, I thought things were going well.  Until that is, the dawn of my 16th birthday when things went terribly awry.
I was scheduled to start at six am to work the breakfast shift and dutifully arose to join the workforce as a responsible and contributing citizen, birthday or no birthday. Things were going alright, until about nine am when the morning rush arrived.  I had a long line at my till, and assuming that serving the customers always takes precedence, I stayed at my till taking orders until the line had gone down. Suddenly, I heard a shrill scream originating from deep in the freezer room.  I walked at a quick pace in my sensible black shoes (safety first!) to find my manager clutching a bag of hash browns, red in the face.  
You see, while I thought I was doing the right thing in serving the customers first, I had actually committed a cardinal sin.  I had not put any hash browns in the deep fryer.  Without hot hash browns, how were we to serve all of the customers I had just rung through?  
I see the error of my ways now, but at the time, all I could do was nod and blink really quickly to avoid crying in front of my middle aged manager.  The tears did flow as soon as my dad arrived in front of me, having stopped by for a coffee to wish me well on my birthday.  
Shortly after this disastrous day I had to call in sick, and when I came in for my next shift, I was called in to the manager's office and given the heart breaking news that I just wasn't McDonald's material.  They never gave me a specific reason, and weren't required to because I was still under probation, but I knew it was the hash brown incident without a doubt.  I spent the rest of the summer sulking, wondering how I would ever find a place in the working world if I couldn't cut it at McDonald's, the same place that had given Jay Leno and Star Jones their start.
I did get over it eventually and rejoin the working force, and was never fired from a job again.  But that greasy little skeleton in my closet haunts me still.  What I wish most is that I had photographic proof of my former employ, but for some reason my mom wasn't jumping for the camera to do a McDonald's uniform fashion shoot. Odd, I know.
Wishing you a wonderful Saturday,
Shelby