Tough as Leather

Our family’s barn always smelled like dusty leather.

Waiting tables in the Black Hills during the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally is a way to become educated in quite a few topics. I turned 15 the first summer I was a server at a local café during bike week. I worked breakfast, the time when bikers want coffee, sometimes a bloody mary, and biscuits and gravy. I was usually the only rested person in the room, brought them caffeine, and kept smiling even when they came in later and later―and more and more hung over―as the week went on, so it was a lucrative first job for a teenager saving up to purchase a car.

Bikers tend to travel in swarms and appear all at once. One minute the dining room would be empty, and the next moment it would be full of people dressed in black leather and bandanas. They needed sustenance before they headed out onto the highway to go sightseeing, and they were ready to get on the road as soon as their credit card slips were signed.

Now, don’t get me wrong, most “bikers” in real life are school teachers, doctors, electricians, CEOs, journalists, and others taking a week off to let it all hang out. And boy, did it all hang out. But I really started to love these people. My breakfast customers often were staying on site and came back year after year. I got to know them a bit and could anticipate what they were going to order. I was good at waiting tables. Bikers did pay for my maroon Taurus, provided all my spending money in high school and part of college, and taught me a lot of valuable lessons in life.

It was during this time, and in this place, I acquired the nickname. My name rhymes with quite a few words, so I have been light as a feather. I have forecasted the weather. But this nickname was my favorite: tough as leather. “Heatha tough as leatha” was even written across my birthday cake the summer I turned 16.

I am not sure I really deserved this nickname, but I certainly earned it. I was the last one standing one morning when another server marched over, handed me the coffee pot she had been carrying table to table, and walked out the door. We never saw her again. One year I worked doubles, both breakfast and dinner shifts, for 10 days and somehow kept that smile on my face. At the end of bike week that year, some of my annual biker customers were sad to learn that after five summers, it was time for me to stay in my college town the next year and work toward new goals.

Since that time, I sure haven’t always felt tough. I have closed my office door and burst into tears more than once. I have burned myself out at more than one job. I have not held up well under certain pressures. I have always taken criticism way too personally.

But I think back to that girl carrying four plates at a time, balancing trays of drinks in the air, walking so confidently with her head held high, and I am grateful that at 14 years old I was forced to walk up to total strangers and make small talk before taking their orders. That made me outgoing.

I am grateful that I did have to buy my first car and my school clothes with the money I earned for my early mornings and late nights. That made me frugal.

I am grateful for coming home smelling like some strange mixture of cigarette smoke, grease, and maple syrup. That made me value simple joys like a long, hot shower and the scent of fresh sheets off the clothesline.

I am grateful that dealing with difficult people was something I learned to excel at from the safety of a restaurant kitchen. That did make me tough.

These lessons stuck with me even after most of my work was completed at a desk and behind a keyboard. I remembered those early morning introductory conversations when I had to chair meetings to discuss difficult topics. I remembered the value of a paycheck really was freedom and independence. I remembered the people who were in the trenches and kept them in mind while I worked. There would be plenty more difficult people to navigate, and I remembered those impatient bikers who just wanted a quick breakfast to settle their stomachs.

Looking back, I know my coworkers meant my nickname as a compliment. I took it that way back then, too. The leather part I understand, especially in reference to all the surly bikers I subdued with my charm. But I am not sure I really like being “tough.” I don’t always want to push down my feelings and keep fighting day after day. I don’t think it’s a good idea to keep carrying all that weight and pretending to be tough.

Today, I hope that toughness looks more like persistence mixed with a dose of courage. I didn’t ever give up back then; I stayed until the very last pancake was consumed. And I am not going to abandon the parts of my life that are a bit tough today, either. While waiting tables was my first job, my goal is that this one will be my last job. The one I tough out until it isn’t so tough anymore. It just will take persistence, and some courage, and maybe a bloody mary.