We're Keepers! Day 4

We're Keepers! 

Day 4

September 17, 2019

It's been quite the day here at Mission Point Lighthouse! 

Our day started back in Traverse City. We got up late, enjoyed a leisurely breakfast at our very nice hotel and then packed up and drove to Meijer for our last minute supplies. Oh, I guess I should mention that we stopped at Biggby Coffee first. I filled my big thermal cup and bought a half pound of ground coffee, because you know...I was there already. Never mind I have about a pound and a half of coffee already ground in my supply box. 

Early in the morning I had made a list of what we needed to buy at the last minute to bring up. It went something like this...bread, milk, eggs, butter...you know the drill. Mr. Quilter Cook asked me how much I thought it might cost and did I think he needed some more cash? Hmm.. Well, I had thought maybe about $30, you know, give or take. I had already packed a ton of stuff already. 

We both had a plan when we walked through the doors and each took a cart and we were off. We met up about 20 minutes later and let me tell you I could see that we had surpassed the $30 by a longshot. 

Oh well, I guess we aren't driving back into town for as many meals as we thought during the next week! 

It was around 11:30 when we arrived at the lighthouse. Ginger, our trainer said to go ahead and unpack the car and settle in. Afterwards, we reported to the gift shop, which is through a magic door from our living quarters. Speaking of, we have a living room, bedroom, bathroom with a washer/dryer, dining room and kitchen. Not bad. Not great, but not bad either. 

So, from 11:30-5pm, we basically stood in the same spot on the floor watching her do transactions on a Square point of sale ipad. Yes, standing. No sitting, no break. If there is something I cannot tolerate is WATCHING someone do something telling me to punch this or that button and assuming as I WATCH them I know what they are doing. Really, it about made me crazy. Truth be told, it was that whole "first day on the job" jitters that was getting to me I suppose. 

 I thought I would die from arthritic pain before the day was over. We took charge now and then and when she had her hour lunch break.She offered us no break the entire day. 

 I am writing this tonight from a pain scale of about 8 with swollen and painful joints and feet (the swelling popped two former hairline fractures in one of my feet-so I'm not really happy right now).

I understand that this gal does this job herself all day at times but it's totally a different experience for volunteers not used to standing like this. Training should have consisted of some kind of movement, walking around, sitting at the table while some other volunteer she called came and covered the gift shop. You don't expect people to just stand there like that. It was totally stupid in my opinion. I started wondering how fast I could repack the car a few times. Mr. Quilter Cook saw my frustration and gave me the "cool your jets, she'll be out of our hair tomorrow..." look more than once or twice.

At 5pm, we locked the gates around the lighthouse and beach and the fun began. Yes, we checked the tower for people first. After counting down and balancing the till we performed real light keeper duties. They included:

1)  Securing all outside buildings for the night. 

2)  Walking the grounds and picking up trash. 

3) Sweeping the tower from sand and rounding it into a pile and then vacuuming it up. 

4) Sweeping with a hand brush all the sand from the other two stairwells on each step. This was done by brushing  it into the wall on each step and forming a pile. Then, with the vacuum sucking up each of those little piles of sand one step at a time. 

5) Sweeping all rooms in visitor areas with straw broom. Then gathering that sand into a pile on the floor and sucking that up with...you guessed it -the vacuum again.  

6) Finally, then vacuuming up between each wooden plank along the floors in each room. Sand gathers quickly from people walking from the beach and into the lighthouse so there is A LOT OF SAND in those crevices!  

7)Then we washed the big windows up in the tower with Windex and a rag.
8) Finally, we had to sweep all the steps, boardwalk and property that people walk on all the way from the lighthouse to the beach, and pick up and hang all of our rugs outside along the wooden fence that surrounds the property as we went along. Our trainer said that if the sand makes the steps unusable, we'll need to go the garage and get the snow shovel and shovel it off to clear it.
(I'm thinking we find a toddler with a shovel and a plastic bucket and let them go to town! But, hey that's just me.) 

By then, it was 6:30pm. I was so exhausted I was asking myself why in the world WE PAID FOR THIS AS A VACATION?? Who out there thought we were crazy and didn't tell me? lol  

Thank goodness we planned supper here tonight. I dug out an old cookie sheet from the kitchen cupboard and turned it upside down and used it as a pan for our frozen pizza. No pizza cutter either. So, I used a paring knife to cut pieces and I'm happy to report I didn't need the first aid kit pulled out of the supply box. 

After dinner, we went out the beach. It took me some time, but I did it. My foot will no longer fit in my shoe, so that could be an issue for tomorrow. I'm praying the swelling goes down overnight and my foot stops throbbing. I just finally told myself to suck it up. You are on a beach! GET OUT THERE! And, so I did.

I'm sure tomorrow will be better. Our trainer is coming back for opening at 10am. I'm excited. The second she leaves, I'm pulling out a bar stool from the living quarters and sitting on that while we work. If she has an issue, oh well. I can't stand for 7 hours. That's it. 

The curious thing here is that standing for that amount of time is NOT in the job description and I have a real issue with that as a former professional volunteer coordinator. According to federal regulations you must list ALL duties in detail that you require for both paid and non-paid employees/volunteers for a non-profit and expectations and any physical requirements for the job. Period. 

However, please readers....take tonight's blog from a standpoint of my pain and exhaustion. I have every reason to believe that this will turn out just fine. I'll be better in the morning. 

So, no worries. It's all good... or it will be. I'm not a quitter. Ok, I've had my moments but this will not be one of them.  

Lights out at the lighthouse! (That's for darn sure! I'm pooped!) 

The Quilter Cook xoxoxo