The Best Things That Have Ever Happened To Me: Part I

Once upon a time, I dropped out of college and got a job at a Booster Juice.  And it was one of the best things I ever did for myself.  The end.

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Okay fine, at the time, I felt like it was one of the worst things I had ever done for myself, but now when I look back I'm so glad that I did.  Here's why...

After graduating from high school, I moved far away from home to go to college.  It was a big deal, and I was a big deal.  It was a big deal because I had been accepted into a very difficult program to get into, especially for a wee little 18 year old.  As for myself, well, I was an even bigger deal.  I was moving away with a pocket full of scholarships and the pride of graduating as number two in my class, the student body president, and the year book co-editor.  I had my life all planned out and somewhere in the distant future I could see myself making bucket loads of money as a highly sought after Respiratory Therapist.

But then school actually started and by the time I was coming home for Thanksgiving, which is only about 5 or 6 weeks into the first semester, I knew I had made a horrible mistake.  I hated school.  There was no way I could ever see myself working as a Respiratory Therapist.  I was completely miserable.  I complained to my parents and they reassured me it would get better.  But it never did.  

There was the day our teacher showed us a presentation on gory injuries, so that we could prepare ourselves for the types of awful things we might eventually see.  Then there were the two weeks spent doing clinical and hospital rotations where I had the great pleasure of going to a cancer clinic.  My mind was completely and utterly made up that I couldn't continue into my second year of school after being present as a young mother completed a lung test.  After she left, my preceptor told me she most likely had a lung tumour and her prognosis wasn't going to be very good.

And so my mind was made up.  I was going to quit this prestigious program.  But that was as far as I had thought things out.  When the school year ended, I returned home to my usual summer job as a lifeguard at the town pool, where I was still a big deal.  Then summer ended and the pool closed.  So it was time to find a new job.

To this day, I have no idea why I didn't just lifeguard at an indoor pool.  I had the qualifications, just not the foresight I guess.  Anyways, I applied to any place I could find an ad for.  It seemed like no one was hiring.  It took weeks to get a job until finally, I got the call from Booster Juice saying that they would like to hire me.

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It didn't take long before the excitement I felt for finally getting a job quickly faded into embarrassment.  Who knew that everyone would immediately assume that I was going to school and ask me what I was studying?  Every time I was asked that question, I would literally cringe.  I could feel my face go red with my reply of, "Actually, I'm working," always followed by the most fervent silent prayers begging that they wouldn't ask where.  But they would always ask.  And I would always have to tell them the truth.  "Booster Juice."

It was a sad reality that I finally found myself living in.  I was no longer a big deal.  In fact, I was nothing more than a Smoothie Technician.  Or at least that's what it said in the job description.  Instead of studying and moving forward with my life, I was stuck working at a fast food restaurant, and not even that.  I made smoothies for a living.  And I was mortified.

Although Booster Juice did have it's perks, such as becoming good friends with one of the most beautiful and talented women I know, there was no way I could let myself see the wonderful things at the time.  I was blinded by the pain of my shrinking ego and by the sting of my wounded pride.  In fact, whenever I saw somebody I knew coming into the store, I would sneak into the back to do something like this...

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I was Kristen Gibb!!!!  I didn't belong in a smoothie shop!!!!

Eventually I did move on.  I graduated from my time at Booster Juice.  And as the years wore on, I eventually came to understand just how important this experience was for me.  I needed a serious slice of humble pie force fed to me.  

Nowadays, I look back on this trying and embarrassing time for myself as one of the most important and best experiences I have been through thus far.  I learned the most valuable lesson that I am, in fact, not a big deal at all.  I am no better than anyone else.  And I am definitely not better than working at a job where I make smoothies for people.  I'm so grateful I had this opportunity more or less thrust upon me.  I'm so grateful I could have the pride pretty well beat out of me.  And I'm so grateful that I could have a hands on, real-life lesson in humility.  I really needed it.