My older sister recently left. I didn’t want her to leave, especially as we had only gotten to know each other for four months. At least I’ll be able to visit at her new home. However, I didn’t want her to leave because I know things won’t be the same. I’m going to miss the hugs, the talks we had about everything and anything. If there is one consolation I can take in her leaving, it is that it was for a good reason. After all, she has started dating my big brother.

Now before you get some weird ideas about incest and start making judgments about my family, I should explain a few things. Krista and Michael are not related, nor are they biologically part of my family. Rather, they are, or in Krista’s case was, two of my fellow managers in the family that is the employees of Gap Stores Rockingham.

For over forty months now I’ve been an employee at Gap #2260. I started back on July 12th, 1998 as just another sales associate. Now I am a member of the management staff as a sales supervisor and hopefully soon maybe an assistant manager. Over these three years I’ve worked with many different managers, let alone the scores of sales associates who come and go each season. In fact, totaling it up, I’ve worked with 38 other managers over that time period, including those who still work at my store right now. I could try counting associates, but after a while it becomes a pointless task. I could probably fill a whole paragraph just with the number of Kristen’s and Lindsey’s.

In my time there, I have met many people that I won’t forget, for better or for worse. I’ve also seen people come and go in less time than it takes me to drive from here to Springfield and back. Even with this constant turnover, a fact that anyone who works in retail quickly learns to accept, I still consider my store to be a home and the employees to be members of my large extended family.

A family must start at the top with a matriarch and I have the best boss in the world. Lisa has been the general manager of my store for just over two years now, and they have been the best times I’ve ever had at any job in my life. Lisa is not only a mother in the terms of this analogy of a family; she literally is like a second mother to me. She allows me to come home any weekend I want and work, whether it’s three weekends in a row or when there’s a five-week gap (pun intended) between working weekends. She also was the one who pushed me in the direction of becoming a supervisor and has supported me at every moment. Even if everybody who is supposed to be at work is there, I’m always welcome to come in and help out.

Trying to describe why Lisa is such an awesome boss and an equally wonderful person is a hard task. I hope everyone at some point in his or her life has been blessed with the perfect boss, for it is a truly beautiful thing. Lisa and I email each other when I’m away at school to keep updated with what’s going on. We value each other’s opinion on almost everything (Politics is the one thing we avoid, as we are usually at the opposite end of the spectrum).

If Lisa is my mother, than Michael most certainly is my older brother. Michael and I have known each other since my 2000 Spring Break, when I came in three days that week at 5 a.m. to help with the arrival of our new spring line. From the moment I met him, I knew that his energy, work ethic, and especially his off-beat sense of humor would be characteristics to help form a bond. Michael from day one has given me a hard time about everything, not the least of which is my penchant for pop music (I’ve tried to convince him that one can only listen to Pearl Jam for so long, but he doesn’t seem to get it).

Michael also was the first person to help me on the journey towards being a more well-rounded employee. Over the summer of 2000, under Michael’s guidance, I became a merchandising specialist. Things went so well that my district manager gave me a coveted Gap Service Excellence Pin for my hard work merchandising all summer. Even now as a supervisor, to this day I’m only a certified specialist in one area: merchandising.

Now I don’t want people to get the idea that the only people that I’m close to at work are managers. It’s actually quite the opposite. I’ve worked with numerous people over the years who I’d be proud to call friends. There’s my buddy Rich who I can talk to about everything and anything. Marina is another pal who I gossip with all the time. Julie absolutely seems to idolize me and is absolutely ecstatic when we are working together. Some of my friends are away at college like myself (Jen F., Lauren). Others, like Nato, are fairly new there. Still there are those who used to be sales associates and are now managers like myself (John, Scott, Mikey G.). Even the people that I know will never be back to touch my heart. I’ll never, ever forget Jared.

I expect a majority of sales associates to come and go with some frequency. Even managers get shuffled around. Each time that happens I simply pray that I get to keep my favorite managers. This time though, Krista had to leave. Krista had only been with us for a few months, but in that time she brought more organization and sanity to the way we as a store run the sales floor than we had seen in all my time at Rockingham. More than all that though, was the cheerful mood that she was always in which helped make more work that much more fun. As I have lost my pop culture companion, there will definitely be a void at work without our Backstreet Boys vs. NSYNC discussions.

Now as much as I’m going to miss Krista, that was not the reason I started writing this. Her departure was just another example of how much my work does feel like a family. I’ve had other jobs before, but it wasn’t the same. I could call my co-workers at WMUA a family, but that would only be the kind of family that makes appearances on the Jerry Springer Show. My past three years at the mall have been amazing time of self-discovery. I had my first true crush. I’ve learned where my strengths and weaknesses lie in working with others. And perhaps most importantly, I’ve learned that more than almost anything else, for a great job you must not only enjoy what you do, but you must love the people you work with.

I can only wish that each of you has a work that is such a wonderful and supportive place. I hope I enjoy every job I have throughout my life as much as I enjoy my current place of employment. As much as I hate to think about it, there will be some day when I will leave the Gap behind. It will be a sad day I’m sure, but I always have memories like this to look back on:

One year after being given a surprise birthday card that was signed by all employees present that day in our store, I was once again found myself working on my birthday. As it became time for my break, I proceeded into our back room to find the two other managers on that day as well as a former manager who now works at a different location. In the center of all of them though, was Lisa, standing there with a box full of cupcakes, a beanie bear, and another employee-signed card. I seriously thought I was going to cry as I walked over and hugged Lisa. I wonder what I’ve done to deserve birthday surprises two years in a row. It doesn’t matter really. For like my own family, I know that my co-workers love me with all their hearts.