Korner Diner

I drove up I-95 to Newark, DE a couple weekends ago. I was meeting a friend at the Korner Diner for a late lunch. The mood inside the diner that day was a buzz of energy, but I could sense an undertone of sadness. It was as if the whole room could feel that their time was almost up, but nobody wanted to acknowledge it unless they had to. They were all going about their business like it was any old day. The jukebox began echoing the mournful notes of Coldplay’s The Scientist. I looked up from my French fries into the face of a waitress with tears trickling down her face. Today was the death of the Korner Diner.

My friend Bethany goes to the University of Delaware and has worked at the Korner Diner for the past four years. Every time I visit her at school we always end up at the diner. Any time of day we can walk in the doors and expect to find familiar faces and someone to sit and chat with. For Bethany, the Korner Diner has been a home away from home and her coworkers have become good friends. When she heard that the diner would be closing for good, it was by far the most disappointing thing to happen to her during college.

As the last customers paid their bills, the jukebox moved on to Eric Clapton’s Tears in Heaven. And there were more tears: another waitress hugging one of the hosts, Bethany tearing up over the last milkshake she’d ever make. I know what you’re thinking. This all sounds so sappy and cliché and it was just a diner after all. Well you’re right, it was just a diner. But it was our diner.

An Ideal Career

I’ve never been one to get really excited about “what I want to be when I grow up.” It’s taken me most of my life to get to the point where I am now. I’d most like to work in a media-related field, like radio, television, or something similar. I’m not looking to work a job that requires a lot of sitting around in an office setting. I would like to be able to do different things every day at work and to truly enjoy my job, something I’ve noticed a lot of people are missing.

I think this says that I value simple happiness more than I value getting ahead in this world. My ideal job does not revolve around making as much money as I possibly can; instead it must be a job that I would not dread showing up for every day. My American dream is a very personal one. I just want to find something I love to do and do it, and then figure out the rest of my life.

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