The PZO

How could I not derive comfort from remembering the pizza joint which I dedicated three years of my life to.

For that matter I have difficulty remembering my life before Piezano's. Classes, future plans, grades, girls, drugs, and college came and went but Piezano's stayed with me. From the day I turned on my application (written on a piece of scratch paper) to pilfering the picture of Pizza Mannnn which hung in the store for two decades I have seen just about everything a driver can.

So hard to believe that I will not drive a car for the next ten months.

I can say with great confidence (no hay dudo que) I left it better than I found it. I didn't do it alone. I didn't do it all. I did make a contribution that lasted.

The week I left the dining room was in disarray. I walked down the stair I'd walked down a thousand times before. The dead leaves and spiderwebs exactly where I left them. The carpet still bunching up by the door and the handrail pulling away from the wall as I used it to stabilize my flight. Everything seemed muted. Quieter. The ringing of the freezers and refrigerators dulled by the news. In five days I'd be off to a foreign land to learn a professional trade without anyone familiar.

First to find me, which meant first to know, was Kylie. The little blonde girl with aspirations of superstardom. She reacted with a mixture of excitement and loss. "What will we do without you?" she said. Half out of congratulatory teasing, half as an eleventh hour attempt to convince me otherwise.

The news spread like Jenna Haze from there. Some reacted with sarcasm, such a classic defense mechanism. Telling me I'd be back before my contract ended or I'd be caned within hours of my arrival or (my personal favorite) I'd be deported for saying "something stupid about Communism." The year is young.

A group of young 'uns were chatting by the destroyed dining room before they found out. I walked up to them to give the news, which they already knew. Drop clothes on the floor, a drill on the table, a paint roller running over the exposed walls which once held an odd paneled mirrors which reflected me in so many mindsets and moods. The plans on the way, new paint, new art, new ceiling tiles, new chairs, new tables.

I remember the rickety chair that collapsed under my weight two years ago. I remember the day the "Weasel Jungle Gym" (a lattice octagon reaching from floor to ceiling completed by the vines of a long dead house plant creeping up the side before expiring) was thrown in the garbage. The ancient wood cracked and flaking at the screws which barely held it together. The checkered table clothes stained with the oil of a decade's use. The New carpet to be installed after my departure was the most crippling part.

"When do you leave?"
"Five days."

Perhaps the real Piezano's came to me that day. This was really happening. This was the end of an old life. The florescent lights did no reflect well off the dried pizza sauce and drain cover oozing the orange grease I identified with so many late nights and freshly awake afternoons. But it was never about the job. It was about the people.

Driver's Wanted:
Local restaurant is looking for car owners to stand in raw sewage for five to nine hours a day for minimum wage. Must have middle school education or equivalency degree. Pot smoker preferred. Benefits include gas compensation, free uniform, unrestricted smoking on deliveries, and all the refuse of the elite you can eat.

What will become of you, my first occupational love?