Changing Spaces, part four

I’m quitting my waitressing gig.

I had to blink away the tears on payday when I saw I had only $40 more than a co-worker who had only worked 48 hours when I had worked 78.

Not understanding the restaurant business and the fact that small paychecks are standard, I was naively counting on the money that wasn’t going to be in my paycheck.

I admit the situation I’m in now is my own fault. I took a job at a struggling restaurant that is overstaffed and under patronized. I didn’t stick to my budget and I spent money like I was still making $200 an hour.
I booked a flight to Las Vegas for nine days in December.

Take away the friends, gambling, clubbing, and fine dining that’s part of a typical trip to Vegas and you’re left with my upcoming stint in sin city: All work and no play.

It will be exhausting.

Shifts end between 3 a.m. and 8 a.m. because in Vegas most of the action and money happens after 2 a.m.
It will be unhealthy.

I won’t have a refrigerator or stove, so I’ll be forced to eat at restaurants. Since the goal is to make money — not spend it — my meals will be cheap and unhealthy.

It will be lonely.

The only people I’ll have contact with will be around the strip club: customers, bouncers, strippers, taxi cab drivers. No one will know my real name or the real me so although I’ll have plenty of conversations they will all be hollow, almost like having none at all.

I feel defeated: I relapsed. But I can and will get back on the wagon.

This trip is my bail-out plan. When I get home I’m paying off my credit cards and school expenses and then I’m hitting the pavement for a new waitressing job.

I am NOT back on the pole.