It was a bright, sunny morning when I arrived at River Valley Golf Course as a nervous wreck. Today was my first day at my new job of being a cart boy. This was my first real job so I wanted to make a good first impression for my bosses. Before I went inside, I checked over my attire. My shirt was tucked in, ironed, and straight. ?Good,? I thought, now looking down toward my shoes. ?Perfect,? I remembered to wear my dress shoes and socks. Feeling confident that I didn?t forget anything I entered through the front door to see my boss. He cheerfully said, ?Hello Dan, how?s it going today?? I responded, ?Pretty good all things considered, you?? ?I?m doing alright,? he said. ?Now I?m ready to show you how to be a good cart boy.? He went on to tell me he was sure I would turn out to be a grade A cart boy and blah blah blah.
Thinking
E-Z-GO golf cart in South San Francisco, Californi...
English: Off road gas golf cart.I didn?t really pay attention to him; I was just trying to get myself orientated with my new surroundings and listen to all the things I had to do.
The first thing he showed me was how to properly park a golf cart. He went over all the steps: clean it out, put a scorecard and pencil on it, gas it up, spray it down with the hose, and then park it. ?Wow,? I thought. There were a lot of things that I could screw up. Ed, my boss, did a few carts and then told me to try a few on my own. My first cart was going extremely well until it came to backing it into the parking spot. Now this may sound easy, but it?s not. If you?ve never parked a golf cart before you might compare it to parallel parking your car. My first attempt was an utter failure. I backed up way too far and straight into a wood fence. Ed said, ?That?s alright it takes everyone a while to get it right, just keep on trying.? ?Sure easy for you to say,? I thought as I finally got it somewhat parked in the spot on my third try. Well, I parked golf carts for a couple hours, not really seeing any improvement in my backing skills and somewhat distraught over it all when Ed came out of the clubhouse to talk to me. He said, ?You?re doing a great job now. How about I show you how to clean the bathrooms.? ?Alright,? I said, though not really wanting to go with him because I had never cleaned a bathroom in my life and had no idea how to do it. Well he led me to one of the bathrooms and showed me how to do everything. Ed told me that since this was my first night, he would take it easy on me and do most of the job for me. He cleaned the sink, mirrors, and the toilet. As I started to take the cleaning supplies back to the closet he said, ?Wait, we still need to mop the floor. That sounds like a good thing for you to do.? ?No,? I thought, ?not mopping? I had never touched a mop in my whole life. After sharing this with him he told me that it was no big deal. All you had to do was get hot water, throw pine sol in it, and then in his words, ?Go to town on it.? Well I went to town on it and it turned out not to be that bad. The rest of the night I did a lot of other small jobs that Ed had me do. At the end of the night he told me that I had done a great job and that he would see me tomorrow.
Through this experience I learned not to be afraid of new situations. You can?t hold yourself back from doing something just because you are afraid you will look stupid. You have to just dive right in and screw up. Everyone is bad when they do something for the first time, but with lots of practice you will get better eventually. Well I have worked at River Valley Golf Course for two years now. Looking back on my first day, I can?t believe that I ever thought this job was hard. But I guess everything becomes second nature to a person if you give it enough time.
Golf carts
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