Humbug

A guest not long ago commented that she felt awkward and confused at check-out when confronted with the gratuity line on her credit card receipt - and recommended we clarify the resort’s tipping protocol ahead of time. Though she left a tip at her table as well as in her room, she felt compelled to ante up yet again, not wanting to appear like Scrooge.
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This was an observation after my own heart, for it was delivered not in passive-aggressive wrapping but in a constructive spirit, sealed with a solution. The remark also illuminated a core principle of what we hope the Evins Mill experience would be - which is to say, free from uncertainty. We wish for guests to depart more rejuvenated than when they arrived - and view ambiguity as an energy-sapping agent.
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Furthermore, I’ve been grousing about gratuity for years, as the practice has in my estimation been abused, proliferating from an intensely service-oriented field to arenas where it is ill-construed. Why am I expected to tip a bellhop or barber? Why not throw in the store clerk as well? And speaking of clerks, what’s with that tip jar, behind which some punk just poured you a $5 cuppa joe?
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Tipping at a restaurant is of course a different matter, for in most instances servers are paid far less than minimum wage and depend on gratuity for their economic well-being. But it is precisely this reliance that prompts me to harbor misgivings even here – as tipping foists upon the patron a judicial role in the waiter's livelihood. And assigning responsibility for grade of service can be challenging.
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If the service is deplorable, is my server simply inept and undeserving - or did a colleague fail to show, requiring him to cover twice as many tables. If my server strikes me as gruff, maybe she’s in the wrong profession and unworthy - or maybe we simply have disparate notions of how chummy a server and patron should be. I’m uncertain - and that’s the point.
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In some instances, the restaurant may bear primary responsibility. In trying to cut labor costs, perhaps it scheduled too few servers. Maybe its hiring and training systems are not up to snuff. Surely it will suffer as a result, but so too might a capable server who was not responsible for these failures. Again, I’m uncertain - and again, that's the problem.
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I’m eager to compensate good service - or assign accountability for otherwise if I could fairly do so. But as illustrated above, one can't always, and I wonder if patrons and employees alike would be better served if we jettison tipping altogether and simply reward organizations that attract able servers with robust wages. That was actually the model at Evins Mill for years, though over time employees asked me to incorporate gratuity.
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Fearing it would tread on my precious principle, I resisted at first but eventually acquiesced, for some felt quite strongly about the matter. I also began to appreciate that some guests take pleasure in tipping. And though I didn't perceive its benefit to me at the time, and while I continue to compensate our waitstaff at well above minimum wage, tipping does alleviate payroll inflation.
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Despite my ambivalence and granted my bias, I am inclined to believe that if anyone deserves a fiscal pat on the back, it is the folks who work at Evins Mill. And judging from the tips our guests left them in 2009, I am not alone in this sentiment and am genuinely delighted for my staff - all of whom are most grateful for the generosity. Of this if nothing else, I am absolutely certain.

Mama's Boy

Even as I publish this post, my mother is at Evins Mill replacing the Inn's Fall decor with a Christmas motif. Two months from now, she'll adorn the property with hearts for Valentines Day, then pastel colors for spring, followed by a patriotic theme for summer - after which the cycle repeats itself. She’s performed this ritual exquisitely and free of charge since 1994 - and a good thing too, as God knows I wouldn't pay someone to do it, or what the place would look like were I decorating it.

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I suspect the only pleasure my mother derives from this routine is knowing that she's helping me. If true, this inkling would elucidate a seminal feature of our relationship - that is to say, her giving and my receiving. One ambit of this give-and-take involves food, for even as a grown man, I still receive from my mother periodic caches of pimento cheese, egg salad and a bevy of other homemade delights, including meatless chili to accommodate my new found vegetarianism.

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Her helping hand extends beyond creature comforts. As if rooting for me at yesteryear's high school wrestling match, she is consistently among the first to applaud these essays. More welcome than this, she - along with my father it should be noted - routinely hosts my young daughter for sleepovers. While both enjoy Ivy's company, my mother seems dually motivated by the reprieve it gives her son from the duties of parenthood. Though her baby boy no longer seeks such aegis, he remains touched by the maternal impulse that compels it.

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Say what I might, perhaps the best vantage point from which to capture the depth of my mother's devotion is found in a book called The Giving Tree, which portrays the relationship between a boy and a tree as they grow older. On one hand, the story illustrates profound generosity, for the tree bestows everything she has to bolster the boy - at first her apples for the scamp to eat, later her limbs for the young man to build a house, then her very trunk for the older man to craft a boat, and finally her stump for the codger to take a load off.

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As it turns out, the story also depicts gross ingratitude, for the grown man not once expresses affection for the tree nor reciprocates her kindnesses - never does he mulch around her base, fertilize her soil or so much as lift a hand for the tree - unless wielding an ax. Indeed, the ingrate only visits when something's in it for him and fails to utter a word of thanks for all he's received. I am guilty of at least one offense, but it is not ingratitude - at least not toward my own giving tree.

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So as I bask in the thankful afterglow of the holiday just celebrated and anticipate my mother's December 1st birthday, perhaps this public encomium will reinforce my hitherto private expressions of appreciation - and serve as a more fitting birthday gift than anything else I could otherwise tender. And as to the above referenced offense, it is shamelessly tugging on heartstrings of mothers everywhere - especially mine own, whom I love very much and for whom I am most grateful. Happy Birthday Mom!

Man Up

I recently hatched this rather elegant idea for a development at Evins Mill, which is a peripheral yet necessary predicate to the subject at hand. To the east of our last guest house on the other side of a wide ravine is a thickly forested ridge top overlooking a deep gorge, Fall Creek and the precipice of Carmack Falls itself. The idea may be as brilliant as the land is beautiful.

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As economic conditions improve, we develop this woodland into lots for the construction and sale of vacation rental homes. Variations of the concept are manifold, but in any scenario owners could partake of all the resort's amenities, as well as the services of its maintenance, grounds and housekeeping staff. Equally compelling, our sales office could effectively rent their homes either in tandem with or independent of its own operations.
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And the Inn - without assuming the unsavory risks of owning the homes - could double its overnight capacity, allowing it to host larger corporate events which it now must routinely decline. In addition to amplifying the Inn's share of the corporate market, the expanded capacity would also augment its food & beverage sales and generate a respectable revenue stream via rental and maintenance agreements.
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Brilliant is too strong a word, for it implies originality - and there's nothing faintly unique about the proposal. Unique or not, the more circumspect might divine boondoggle rather than bonanza - and they would have a compelling case too. The land would be costly to develop and sire only a handful of lots. The added capacity could potentially transform the essence of our business - and alienate a loyal clientele in the process. Oh, and did I mention - I have no idea how to pull any of this off?
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And there's another pesky fly in the ointment - we don't own much of the required acreage - an adjacent farmer does. And a farmer, whose family may have owned the land for generations, can have an ancestral attachment to his soil, refusing to part with a family jewel for any price. Fortuitously, this farmer is willing to sell, and more than that, suggested I acquire more soil than needed - beautiful acreage that would serve as a buffer between his farmland and our development. What a break.

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Not so fast, for most anyone will sell you most anything for a price - and his is a deal-killer. The opening salvo of our negotiations came unexpectedly - kind of like an ambush is unexpected. Standing under a tree in the pouring rain on the land in question - city boy in crisp button down and old timer in crinkled overalls - he asked me my price. To my low-ball offer he gruffly grunted "Oh, no, no, no - we can't talk like that. No sir, can't talk like that."
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His stance is not problematic in and of itself and is a routine feature of this particular dance. The dilemma is my capacity for negotiation, which is negligible at best. I'm analytical rather than aggressive, and given to cooperation rather than cajoling. At peace with my strengths and weaknesses, I do in these "to be or not to be" moments envy those who can bluff and bully - that is to say, mislead and overpower to further their interests.

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And something tells me that little I learned in business school will help me as I haggle with this plainspoken and weather worn farmer. If in a few years you start receiving solicitations regarding "Ridge Top Estates" or "Chalets at Evins Mill," you'll know I manned up and negotiated with nerve and cunning. Silence will likely mean failure - and on a very personal level. So wish me luck or give me counsel, for after all, I need some land I'd like to sell you.

Vegetarian

As I hope most guests of Evins Mill would agree, cuisine is nuclear to the experience of staying at the Inn. And since we serve from a limited menu, we take great pains to uncover special dietary needs, or SDNs, which fall into three distinct categories: personal preference - "I don't like...", medical necessity - "I'm allergic to...", and principled choice - “I won’t eat...."

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After diabetics, vegetarians constitute the most common SDN group and occupy a singular place in our pantheon of SDNs, for in most cases their requests seem driven not so much by preference or need as by studied decision. Initially I recorded such requests with bewilderment or rolled eyes. Why would anyone voluntarily forgo such delicacies as bacon or a choice steak?
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Until twelve years ago, I hadn't a clue, for through my early adulthood, I knew of no one who would shun a succulent slab of flesh. Consequently, I associated vegetarians with a mélange of not entirely fair stereotypes – bohemian, tree-hugging, free-thinking, pot-smoking, yoga-loving beatniks. You get it - the kind of stereotype born of ignorance or fear that one can easily drape over anything foreign or threatening.
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Then in 1997 I met, promptly fell in love with and eventually married one of these nuts. Eden lived up to a few of the stereotypes, prompting endless references among friends to Dharma & Greg, the 90s sitcom about a traditionalist and his “new age” wife. While Eden dispelled more vegetarian cliches than she confirmed, it was only a matter of time before my carnivorous background collided with her plant-based diet.
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Our first argument was sparked when she refused to taste my shrimp etouffee. So irked, I insisted all the more. The more I inveighed, the more she pushed back. Needless to say, I didn't get lucky that night. If she were allergic to shellfish, that would have been one thing, but she rejected my offer on principle. And there is something about a principle when it comes to our ingestion, akin to matters of politics and religion, that elicits from many, myself included at the time, a visceral reaction.
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Maybe it’s how a wine lover might feel at a party she’s hosting when serving her cherished Pinot Noir - and a guest refuses on grounds he doesn’t drink. If the guest simply doesn’t like the taste of alcoholic beverages, it’s copacetic, but if the refrain is predicated on moral principle, drinkers may feel a twinge of judgment, which may be one reason I was so incensed by my date. As an aside, I would have rejected the host’s kind offer too - and in the next breath requested a G&T.
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But back on point. I’m not the only one who gave Eden a hard time. Over the years, I’ve watched many others poke and prod her vegetarianism, and not from a genuinely curious place either but with veiled derision. Whatever the provenance of these jibes, my own dim view of vegetarians was naturally attenuated by the mere fact I was married to one – turns out we have more pressing issues about which to disagree.
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Five years ago my views softened further after reading a book titled Eat, Drink and Be Healthy penned by a Harvard nutrionist, which makes a compelling case, backed by mounds of scientific evidence, that our bodies are better served by abstaining from most flesh. My discomfort with vegetarians wilted further as I read article after article about the gross inefficiencies of generating one unit of protein through raising an animal compared to growing a bean or nut - and the concomitant havoc these inefficiencies wreck on the environment.
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Along the way I read other books, including one titled Fast Food Nation, graphically describing the food processing industry, which actually made me sympathetic to the vegetarian perspective – though not so much to become one yet. Then last month, I had occasion to watch video footage of the same industry in action - the piece de resistance as it were, inspiring me to give vegetarianism a try.

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I should stress to our clientele that when it comes to matters of business, I am if nothing else a pragmatist and would never steer our culinary juggernaut in a vegetarian direction unless the market asked for it, which is to say, not in my lifetime – it is my livelihood after all. But to our vegetarian and vegan guests, you are in empathetic hands regarding our own SDN, which based on the evidence at hand seems as much a logical choice as a special need.
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And to friends confounded by my new gastric status - as I originally was with Eden's, I appreciate your dubiety as much as I am nonplussed by it, for I am growing as pragmatic about my body as I am about my business - G&Ts aside. If the decision behooves not only my health but also the environment and other creatures populating the planet, then all the better. Peace out.

Milestones

I just returned from a brunch at Evins Mill to celebrate a milestone occasion - the Inn's fifteenth year of being in business. Commemorating longevity or tenure, milestones almost always arrive in multiples of five or ten. To wit, there's little fan fair when someone turns twenty-seven. Conversely, there are established rules as to the gifts husbands should give their wives on decadal anniversaries. Who made these rules and on what basis? No doubt some cultural maven for quite nonsensical reasons.
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Who's to tell me I cannot give my spouse a Pez dispenser on our tenth and an obscenely large diamond ring on our eleventh? Only my wallet and wife. Capricious or not, these existential markers lead the contemplative among us to bouts of retrospection, wherein we examine the assets and liabilities of our life’s balance sheet, assign values to both, and thereby ascertain, if you will, the equity of our existence. And as anyone who knows me will tell you, I am as much the bookkeeper as I am the brooder.
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And I've had much to contemplate lately - very soon I will have celebrated three milestones within the span of a year and a few months. Our own age is certainly the leading generator of milestones, and earlier last year, I turned forty. Unlike previous milestone birthdays, forty spawned a sobering acceptance – not so much about mortality as about aging. I consider myself young, but some others apparently think otherwise – a gentleman who I sized up as a contemporary, albeit a younger one, recently addressed me as “sir.”
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The bad news is that the furrows lining my brow are not transitory features resulting from momentary concern or deep thought but are permanent, and growing more conspicuous by the day – as are the crow’s feet assembling around my eyes. But all this is pure vanity - who knows what’s going on beneath the hood? The good news is that I've been blessed with unstintingly good health and remain hearty and hale as far as my physician can detect. And unlike some of my contemporaries with receding hair lines, my mane is replete, giving me a renewed appreciation for Sampson's plight.
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As noted above, I celebrated a second milestone this year – the birthday of Evins Mill, a business I started with my father fifteen years ago. The bad news, if it can be called that, is that I’ll never amass great wealth from the endeavor. It is also a capital intensive business, saddling me with more debt than may be wise for someone of my age or income bracket. The good news is that I am captain, and deck hand, of my own vessel, which though modest in scale is grand in design. And in an economy shedding jobs, that I have one is also good news - and not just a job, but an invigorating vision.
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The best news from Evins Mill - and an "asset" of incalcualable value on my life's balance sheet, sprouted from a chance encounter. I vividly remember meeting Eden there twelve years ago and being smitten with her long black hair and big blue eyes – along with some other fetching endowments. I soon fell in love with all of her and a year later proposed we spend the rest of our lives together. Earlier this month, we celebrated the most seminal of all three milestones this year – our tenth wedding anniversary.
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The bad news is that evolutionary biologists speculate that men and women are not ideally wired for monogamous relationships, and judging from the work, tendered with love I would add, required to nurture a healthy one, I suspect they may be onto something. The good news is that while not entirely without friction, our relationship remains vibrant and loving - to the extent I'm inclined to believe we will share many, many more milestones together.
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I use the word "share" rather than "celebrate," as some milestones will inevitably be somber. And to end on a realistic yet hopeful note, while it's unlikely we'll cross the finish line together, I can only hope we will both be available and adequately sentient to comfort one another as we near that most final of milestones.

Nutjob

I could not locate the phrase or word nutjob in any of the dictionaries I consulted and take its absence as liberty to proffer my own definition...nutjob n. / slang / person whose delusions adversely impact surrounding habitats. Unlike narcissist and bipolar, which are unduly clinical, or jerk and a--hole, which are respectively bland and uncouth, nutjob possesses a richer and more playful timbre - in the same spirit as blowhard, yet, like the term douche bag, is more derogatory than calling someone a piece of work.

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You may wonder how I became an authority on nutjobs. Well, for nearly a decade I lived a stone's throw away from one. Credentials aside, you may then ask how any of this relates to Evins Mill. It doesn't - except for nutjobs. You see, years ago my neighbor converted his residence into what is known as an "event venue," a municipal designation allowing homeowners in residentially zoned areas to host special events.
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If the term special event sounds benign, note that it is often a coiffed euphemism for a large and lively reception. Maybe my friends and I were unusually raucous, but the wedding receptions of my early adulthood were among the most exuberant and profligate events I've had the pleasure of attending – if not always accurately recollecting. Think about it. It's a highly charged affair to begin with. You're young. The drinks are flowing. The band is playing. You and your chums are all dressed-up - and so too is that cute bridesmaid you've been eying. The evening is pregnant with possibility, from romantic forays to sophomoric hi jinks.
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While I can still howl at the moon with as much verve as my younger self once did, I do believe businesses should host such nocturnal revelries in appropriately zoned areas, not in residential neighborhoods. My opposition to this endeavor didn't just irk my nutjob of a neighbor - it drove him apoplectic. With a weak case to defend, he did what many politicians do to advance their interests - deflect attention away from the substance of an issue by impugning the integrity of those with opposing viewpoints. His primary line of attack framed me as a rival business owner, intent on devouring the competition - and his home to boot.
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No matter that dozens of other neighbors with no affiliation to the hospitality industry also opposed it. No matter that Evins Mill is located on a forested and restful forty acres over an hour from the nearest urban center, while my neighbor's home sat on a half-acre lot in an urban neighborhood. No matter that I served on the board of the state association of inns and was later asked to serve as its president. No matter that when my neighbor once inexplicably asked me to acquire his home - and thus his business, I categorically refused.
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No matter that nothing in my biography suggests I am motivated by such avarice. None of this mattered to Nutjob, who incessantly pitched neighbors and city officials alike that I was unscrupulously trying to sabotage his business expressly to benefit my own. So convinced was he of this fabricated and far-fetched reality, he eventually sued me for $50,000 and filed an injunction that would have effectively muzzled my opposition. He later retreated - perhaps even he grasped the absurd.
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Other than disclosing his gender, I've taken every precaution to hide Nutjob's identity. It would be in poor taste to do otherwise, though prudence also played a role - I'm not exactly itching for another fight. To be safe though, I've established a legal defense fund and ask you to consider a donation or note of support by clicking here. Or if you're an attorney and are open to bartering with Evins Mill, call me - after this blog, I may need to lawyer up and mount another defense.