Thank You, Cracker Barrel Lady!

It pays to always be nice, especially around the holidays

Just before a baby is born… and we mean a second before he or she enters the world, there is a course babies can take in the womb that gives them all the tips and tricks to life that can make their stay on earth so much easier. I MISSED THAT CLASS. During this 1-hour session (1-second is 1-hour inside the womb) one of the things babies are told is to never go to Cracker Barrel the day before Thanksgiving. And after forty some odd years on the planet, somehow this advice had never come up in any conversation when discussing where to pick-up your holiday meals to-go.

My wife and I are now past the midway point in our careers. One unfortunate side effect of career progression is getting more work and fire drills around the holidays. Gone are the days where either one of us can take off two weeks straight and not login to our work computers at all. This year has been exceptionally busy as it feels like almost every company is trying to make up for two years of work and time lost during COVID. So, with a few critical deliverables due before Christmas, we decided to not only stay home, but cater most of our Thanksgiving dinner. We decided to cook the main dishes like the turkey, but then go to Cracker Barrel for a few of the side dishes we like.

If you have ever done any road trips around America, hopefully you passed a Cracker Barrel Old Country Store on one of those highways. With locations from upstate New York to California, these restaurants serve comfort food like meatloaf and mashed potatoes and have a country store attached to the restaurant where you can buy small gifts, candy, and even more expensive unique items like a rocking chair (they sell around 70,000 of those each year). They are often right off the highway as nearly 40% of their business comes from travelers with restaurants strategically located off major interstates, typically 45 minutes or longer outside of major metropolitan areas.

This would be our first year ordering a holiday meal to-go from Cracker Barrel and the food is good, so I didn’t mind driving 30 minutes to go pickup our order that was placed last week.

I had not been to this location before but it’s along a fast part of the interstate. You have to speed up pretty quickly to get on the service road and then quickly turn into their parking lot hoping no one rear ends you from behind. In my zeal to beat traffic I sped up too much and missed the turn, taking the next turn I could find off the service road — only about 100 feet past the restaurant.

This road was adjacent to a large outdoor shopping center with a Walmart and a few other stores nearest the road. As I merged into traffic I was met with a long line of cars, maybe twenty, all waiting in the right lane to make a turn onto another street leading into the Walmart parking lot. The second right turn just greeted me with another long line of twenty cars now clearly turning into the Walmart lot.

I knew Black Friday was essentially running since Monday, so I got in the left lane to pass all the traffic, shaking my head at all the shopping madness.

My usual good sense of direction somewhat betrayed me as I didn’t see a clear path to get from Walmart back to the Cracker Barrel along the highway. I ended up going behind Walmart to find a truck exit that put me right back on the feeder road to the front entrance of the Cracker Barrel. This time, I slowed down and didn’t miss the turn into the Cracker Barrel parking lot.

My mobile confirmation said to drive into one of the curbside parking spaces and then text to let them know I was there — my order would then be brought out.

But there were no parking spaces with curbside/to-go signs.

What I did see was several large tents peeking out from behind the restaurant all setup in the parking lot. An open freight container was positioned at the back kitchen door of the restaurant and a flurry of people were scrambling in every direction — from the kitchen to the shipping container, to the tent, to the cars in a conga line leading out the back of the parking lot.

Why was there a line of cars going out the back of the parking lot?

It was over 100 cars deep and this was not for a COVID test.

I didn’t know there was an entrance from the back of the parking lot! Remember, I missed the first day of class.

I nervously got out of my car and walked up to this young woman asking where was curbside pickup for holiday to-go meals. She replied, equally nervous, “Oh, there is no curbside, this line of cars is to pick up your order.”

But I couldn’t see the end of the line.

I walked away from the tent heading towards the back of the parking lot… I could faintly see a blue sign in the distance, it was the Walmart.

My stomach dropped like in one of those movies when the protagonist suddenly realizes who the killer is — that line of cars coming off the highway and onto the feeder into Walmart wasn’t for Walmart. It was the line for Cracker Barrel.

The line went from Cracker Barrel’s parking lot, through the entire length of the Walmart parking lot, then onto the street and around the corner back to the service road on the highway. It was over 100 cars deep and this was not for a COVID test.

Somehow everyone else knew the routine and I would have to get back on the highway to come back around to get in a line 100+ cars deep for Thanksgiving dinner.

Walking back to the tent a manager quickly came up to me saying they could not take any walk-up pick-up orders. I needed to be in a car, in the line. I was six feet away from getting my meal, my car parked at the end of a median in the Cracker Barrel lot, and here I was being told to get in the 1-hour line. Clearly, they weren’t’ going to be able to honor my 2:45 arrival time.

It felt like a heist and I was the getaway driver… all for some damn cornbread dressing…

I just stood under the tent looking helpless, when the same white woman leaned over and asked my name. I sounded like a kid from Oliver, “My name is Brian ma’am (I’m just a hungry boy from a poor family).” Her question gave me hope. I began talking to her, telling her this was my first time like I was a virgin on prom night. She casually flipped through what had to be hundreds of orders in a looseleaf binder.

She then asked for my pick-up time. No luck. She said she couldn’t find any order for me.

I was about to pass out, but then grabbed my phone and feverishly showed her the order number with items for pickup.

She said, “Look, I’m gonna try and help you out.”

Another older worker came over after half listening to our conversation. She said that they would get in a lot of trouble, but I had been so nice in talking to them compared to other people driving and walking up, who were pissed off about the wait. The young woman couldn’t pull my sheet or make it obvious, so she looked at my phone again, memorized the entire order and said for me to go back to my car and be ready to drive off quick.

If her manager or any customers in their vehicles saw a worker bringing an order outside the line, all hell would break loose.

It felt like a heist and I was the getaway driver… all for some damn cornbread dressing and other items we normally make at home.

After what felt like an eternity of me sitting in my car, I had resigned myself that my order was not coming. Either her manager was watching the tent like a hawk, or she had forgotten I was sitting in the lot where the dine-in customers were going in for lunch.

As I looked down about to put my car in drive, I heard the fast footsteps of someone approaching the back of my car. It was another young girl asking to quickly throw the box of food in my trunk.

She didn’t ask for my name; she didn’t repeat the order… and I wasn’t about to check what was in my box. I sped off looking back wanting to wave at her and the other two co-workers, but they were already heads down, packing more boxes.

These three wonderful women allowed me to cut the line of over 100 people the day before Thanksgiving for no other reason than me being nice. I didn’t get their names, I can’t go back to the restaurant and thank them for fear they might get in trouble, but what they did meant a lot — they were my angels on this day as I needed to be back home to my sick son. It didn’t matter that I had missed class on the day of my birth — today I was getting a break.

I wish those women a very happy holiday and many blessings in the new year.

We often don’t know what people are going through. They didn’t know how my day was going and I can only guess their day was going to be exhausting. They would be packing orders well into the evening.

When things go sideways it’s often the workers having to take the brunt of side eyes and disrespectful comments. I may sigh heavily or curse under my breath but have never taken my frustration out on a worker. My wife will sometimes say I’m almost too lenient with people when they mess up an order or don’t do something to my expectation.

I’ll never know why that woman risked getting in trouble with her manager who was standing not but ten feet away. I had not even been talking to her that long before she decided to help me. Other people came up during that time and every single one of them got turned away and sent to the back of the car conga line.

When I got home and checked my trunk, the order was 100% accurate, perfectly packed, all from her memory.

Keep being nice to people, eventually you get a cheat code that wasn’t covered on that first day of class.

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