I am a firm believer in the quote, "Everything happens for a reason". This quote became very real to me when I stumbled across a person I would never have unless I started my first real job at a Wendy's in my hometown. (How I got the job is a whole nother story in itself.)
I had just lost the two most amazing mother role models in my life. My Mem and my Nana. It was just me and my Papa in the house now, and I had to be the woman in the house and pick up some slack now before I headed off to college.
I came across a manager at Wendy's unlike any other manager there. Maria. She was rude, she was cold, and she did not make the best first impression on me. This was fine, I was just here earning some extra cash.
Until one day, she had yelled at me to go, I don't even know, clean the dining room or something silly. This hit me hard and I had had my first of many breakdowns at Wendy's.
After that, co-workers had told her I was upset and she would joke with me afterward. This reminded me of something my Nana would have done if she was alive. This was someone I wanted to never take for granted because she had strangely helped fill a void in my heart that was left when my grandmothers had passed.
"Everyone please, just call your parents and tell them how much you love them. Never take them for granted."
This is what Maria's son had posted on Facebook on November 15th, of 2016. This is a quote that instantly breaks my heart every time.
No one understood me and Maria's relationship. She even came to visit me and take pictures with me at my Junior Prom. She knew my grandmothers could not be there so she took the effort to fill this void. This was something she did not have to do, but wanted to. She knew in a short time we had known each other, that we would always have an amazing connection no one would understand.
I wouldn't close late nights until 2 a.m. only if it was on Maria's shift so I could bring her home at 2:30 a.m. safe and sound with her coffee in hand. These little moments were what I lived for. She made me feel whole again, like my grandmothers had given me another one to feel protected and safe.
We would laugh and joke in ways people would not understand! I would call her just to catch up. We even got stopped by police on that ave at 3 a.m. because I didn't have my headlights on! We were so exhausted we didn't even notice and explained to the officer we had just closed at Wendy's and were just tired trying to get home. You bet Maria still got her medium hot regular that night.
We had really only known Maria for two years before she had started to act weird. Something wasn't right. She was sad more often but she would still put on that smile for me.
As of November 16th, 2016, I had seen Maria for the last time. I did not get to hear her voice. I just had to believe that she could hear me when I had whispered in her ear how much she meant to me, and how much I had really loved her with our short time together. It would be selfish of me to say how hard it was for me to watch because what was harder was her whole family surrounding her, and her two sons watching everyone say their goodbyes. That was the hardest part of this all, because that was a few years prior, trying to keep it together for everyone else.
On November 17th, 2017, Maria had joined my grandmothers in heaven. As of this day, I'd like to think she visited and kissed all her family, and later that day, took a visit to my Mem and Nana in heaven, and smiled, and shared all the moments they had all shared with me.
I still, a year later, believe that me and Maria's time was cut way too short. But I will always have that story about that "rude manager that ended up filling a big void in my heart".
