missroserose | Pouring wine for Father's Day

Sunday was kind of an interesting day to work, for me. I have slightly conflicted feelings about Father's Day (stemming from my slightly conflicted feelings about my father, no doubt), but we did have several happy families come in, and it was a bit gratifying to see that not all fathers are washouts after the kids turn 14 or so. (One group that gave me the particular warm fuzzies was a husband-and-wife there with their daughter, who was my age; the father was a die-hard fan of the New York Yankees, and regaled me with stories of taking his daughter to different games over the years.) I did have a couple people ask me where my father was, so I just tried to answer honestly: "Up in Alaska somewhere, I think. I don't talk to him much, but I was lucky enough to have a mother who was awesome enough for both of them."

It was a surprisingly lucrative day for us, as well - "surprisingly" because (as you might guess in Arizona) June's a pretty slow month for businesses, much the same way January is in Alaska. I attribute this in part to people being in a reminiscent and happy mood due to the holiday, and also because the two people selling the wine were Foster and I. (I don't think I've mentioned him here before, but Foster's one of my favorite coworkers; he's an 80-year-old dude who loves to tell stories and chat and argue politics and generally interact with people. As you might guess, this makes him an excellent salesperson as well as a blast to work with.) I even got a super-nice compliment from someone about halfway through the wine list - "You know, I can't say as I'm crazy about any of these wines so far, but you really make me want to buy them." (Fortunately we found a couple that she liked in the second half.)

I'm not sure why I felt compelled to post about this - nothing in particular stood out about the day, except that it was really quite pleasant. Perhaps it just comes down to something another person said to me a while back, that I think sums up what I like about this job: "This seems like it'd be a good job. People come here to be happy."