When senior Lydia Gurley’s friend senior Kadence Rolfzema showed her the incident in the bathrooms at Luna of Ada, Lydia was extremely disgusted by the sight before her.
“Somebody pooped on the floor one time,” Lydia said. “It was gross. I didn’t have to clean it up though. It probably happened five months ago. But I still think about it.”
Lydia has been working at Luna of Ada ever since their grand opening in May of 2022. She initially began her career working at a bridal shop with her mother, “under the table,” as Lydia jokingly says. From there, she decided to upgrade to a job with more independence, eventually landing on Luna.
“I decided to stop working at Bridal Elegance mostly because I wanted a change,” Lydia said. “I didn’t want to just have a job because my mom worked there. I wanted to find [a job] for myself.”
There were numerous advantages to selecting Luna as her place of employment in 2022, as the restaurant is very close to her house. When she applied, the restaurant hadn’t opened yet, which was convenient for her to be one of the first employees working there.
“I learned from a early age the value of hard work. It’s a valuable learning experience that helped me grow and prepare myself for the future life in the workforce.” — Lydia Gurley
Being employed at Luna brings a great deal of benefits, but also some disadvantages. In addition to the incident presented to her by Kadence, working at Luna entails a tumultuous schedule, which can be denigrating to Lydia’s mental headspace.
“Sometimes [my coworkers and I] get out pretty late,” Lydia said. “Our schedule isn’t super consistent. Some days, I’ll get out at 8:00 p.m., and other days I’ll get out at 7:30 or 9:30 p.m. We never really know. And then, in the summer, it’s just super busy. So, it can be stressful.”
However, for Lydia, the profit and the benefits far outweigh the negatives. She earns $12 an hour working four days a week. On top of that and the accessibility, Lydia earns a free meal following every shift. She highly enjoys the food Luna serves, usually getting three tacos or the new California burrito with French fries on top.
Furthermore, Lydia has made multiple new friends at work, some people from FHC she had never known before and others from surrounding districts in the Grand Rapids area.
Lydia cherishes her job since she gets something to do with her free time while also earning money for necessary expenses such as college funds. She plans to work at Luna up until she leaves for college, hoping to begin serving once she turns 18 in January.
Holding a job throughout her high school years has helped Lydia to expand on essential life skills she had only begun to be introduced to in the past. She feels that her job has helped her to prepare herself for life on her own.
“[My job] helped me develop important life skills like responsibility, time management, and financial independence,” Lydia said. “I learned from an early age the value of hard work. It’s a valuable learning experience that helped me grow and prepare myself for my future life in the workforce.”
Having worked at Luna for about two years now, along with helping her mom at Bridal Elegance prior to being a hostess, Lydia has obtained new friends, a positive work environment with fair wages, and fundamental skills such as independence for her future.
A myriad of freshmen and sophomores alike at FHC have yet to apply for their first job. Lydia highly recommends working whenever possible, as she and many other juniors and seniors have benefited from the work ethic and benefits that come from upholding a job.
“I’d recommend working to people,” Lydia said. “You can build connections and learn how to be a good worker as well as learning different skills that you can carry on in life.”
