Missy, Cafeteria, Sidwell Friends School

           I talked to Missy while she chopped red and yellow peppers  for the next day's lunch. She was happy to talk and seemed intrigued by my project. She told me after our interview that she had known I was "kind of off-beat" because of my changing hair color, which she liked. She said she was just the same, always talking to people and listening to their stories.

          
           “Hi, my name is Melissa Dillard and I’m a prep cook. And I do your veggies, your bread, and your garlic bread, and all your good stuff that looks like it has roots on it. I do the veggies and I do the prep, all the little chopping and stuff. I love ‘em all, I love broccoli, bok choy, I love eggplant, a little bit of everything. I’m mainly a veggie eater, so I eat all- zucchini, yellow squash- all the vegetables we serve here. I’ve been doing this for like 27 years. I’ve been with this company for six years. I came from Virginia, from my home corporate office, and I was transferred up here, and I’m liking it. Working here at Sidwell with you guys.

            I’m originally from Virginia but I came here when I was maybe like seven or eight, I started school up here. Then I got married and went back to Virginia and raised my kids there so I was in Virginia like 25 years. So I guess that’s why you hear that funny accent. People ask me where I’m from when they hear my accent. I got that southern drawl and that DC slang. People don’t really know where it come from, people say ‘where you from?’ I say ‘Virginia,’ they say ‘you sound like you’re from the city!’ But if I say ‘the city,’ they say ‘you sound like you’re from the south!’

            I was what you’d call a late bloomer in school… I was wild. You know, fun girl. I kind of marched to my own beat when I was younger, so that’s really bad, you know, ‘cause you’re young. Kind of like a rebel. And I slowly matured and grew into myself, you know, like we most do. I feel like you are who you are. You get a little more mature, you learn some of life’s lessons, but you’re still the same person. Take mother Hazel, you just finished interviewing? If you closed your eyes, you’d think she’s 16. Right, ‘cause you are who you are. Who you are right now is who you’re gonna be. You get more mature and learn more things and add that to your life’s lessons, and it just grow. You never stop.

          I was trying to see age in a different light, cause I’m getting older, I’m 45, but when I met mother Hazel and Ms. Bobby, they made me think totally different about growing old, you know, ‘cause there’s no such thing. You just add to it and you mature but you’re basically the same person. If you was evil when you was younger you’re gonna be evil when you get old. She laughs. Basically.

       I mean think about it in this sense. When you’re a little girl you see your mother, you don’t quite figure out but you know she’s somebody and you kinda see who she is. And when you get older, like you are now, you think about ‘hey, you the same darn person.’ It’s like she never- you grew more to see who she was, but she’s basically the remained the same, you just got to see her a little  better as you got older. And so that’s what it’s like. Your little young nieces or whatever you have, your little sister or whoever, they see you but they don’t really see you. But as they get older, they start seeing you for who you really are. You’re the same person you’re gonna be the rest of your life. That’s the way I look at it.

          I came from a good family so I had no- sometimes kid have an impact that makes them grow up fast- I had a chance to-. I said I was a late bloomer. When I was supposed to be studying I was out partying or something, ‘cause I had a kinda laid-back family. I didn’t have to push it. You know, some families, ‘you gotta get a job and help out around here!’ I didn’t have that. So I continued to party late-until 25 or something- so I advise kids to just stay in school and get their education. And don’t stray from it. If you’re gonna go be something, just go ahead on through with it. Don’t take breaks. Like let’s say you wanna be a doctor. Say, ‘oh, I’ll go back to school next year, I wanna take a year’s break.’ Don’t do it. Keep going. Just keep going until you finish, ‘cause if you stop, life again, something around that time is gonna change your mind. It could be a husband or anything, a fiancé, anything.

             So my advice to kids is whenver they try to go after something just keep going for it. Visualize it and claim it and it’s going to be yours. You know, just set the motion. If you wanna be a doctor, apply to medical school. It’ll never happen if you don’t apply. So just set everything in motion, and visualize it, and claim it."

"You’re the same person you’re gonna be the rest of your life."