The Texas Hot bonus was the best!
A COLUMN By Kathryn Ross
Christmas bonuses are nice, but they are a lot like tips aren’t they? While the employee or server believes they should receive a bonus or a tip, it is really up to the employer or customer as to whether they get one.
I’ve worked a handful of jobs over the years, but only a couple long enough to earn a Christmas bonus. For some, I was thankful to get paid at all. I worked the longest, 35 plus years, for the local newspaper.
Each year whatever organization happened to own the publication at the time, would include our employee bonuses in our holiday paychecks. That may have worked well for them, but a lot of the employees complained that we had to pay taxes on the extra money in our paychecks. It didn’t exactly seem to be the right way to give a bonus. Still, there was always an annual Christmas party with free food and drink, and that was fun. We also had Secret Santas and that worked out sometimes better than the bonus.
The best bonus I ever received was when I was quite young, 20 or 21, in 1970 or 1971. I’d started working as a waitress for the Texas Hot in the summertime. I was on the late shift and back then the restaurant closed at 11 p.m. after the movie theater let out. It was a good time to work. After the dinner rush was over we had some free time. I wrote my first novel on the back of receipts in my receipt pad, then I’d take them home a transcribe them. I was a night owl even back then.
After serving up hots and hamburgers and French fries, we got around to the other parts of the job, refilling the ketchup and mustard, salt and pepper and sugar and napkin holders.
It was all very routine, but Jimmy Raptis and Gus Rigas kept their eyes on us to make sure we were doing the job. They also trained us in how to serve customers.
I’ve often said working at the Texas House was the very best training I ever received for becoming a journalist. Yeah, the p’s and q’s for becoming a professional journalist are important, knowing the rules and following the handbook and learning the ethics are necessary. But, learning to talk to, listen to, and respect people is the real bread and butter of the profession, and that I learned to do from waiting on people of all kinds at the Texas Hot. I also learned tact – how not to gag when the elderly hunter I was waiting on at 5:30 a.m. on the opening day of deer season lit up a pipe filled with sickly, sweet cherry tobacco or when a farmer who still smelled from the barn ordered two on one. I even learned not to laugh when his date threw a milk shake at a young, prominent lawyer – I just got a rag for clean-up.
That first Christmas season I worked there, I was blown away when I learned I’d be receiving a bonus. It was the first time and a new concept to me.
That year I received a 15 lb., frozen turkey and a bottle of wine. I proudly took the turkey home to Mom and we put the wine in the cupboard. I was very happy and pleased to be a contributing member of the household. It was the best bonus I ever received because it told me I was doing a good job
I’ve often thought since, wouldn’t it be nice if our bill collectors gave us December off from paying our monthly bills like rent, utilities, telephone, insurance and car payments. That would be a real Christmas present.
Today, all anybody wants to do is give you a new deal if you just buy this or that new phone and sign up for additional lines or something like that. I wish they would just give me a free month.
It all goes back to that first analogy. Did you earn a bonus, or do you just expect one?
Christmas is a great time of the year to find out what people think of you, whether it’s extra money in your paycheck or presents under the tree with your name on them. It is all dependent on you how you do your job and treat your family and friends, as to what’s under your Christmas tree.
Kathryn Ross is a lifelong Wellsville writer of news and opinion. She pens a weekly column for the Sun, “The Golden Girl,” and can be reached anytime, kathr_2002@yahoo.com
