This is not my first "holiday retail circus" world tour. I have braved Black Friday for almost a decade in one capacity or another. One thing I have learned is that the crew you work with — your year-round and holiday staff, become an interigral part of survival. So here is my homage to them, including the top 5 reasons I love my holiday retail co-workers.

5. We all keep each other caffinated.

"Are you getting coffee?" "Do you care if I grab a Coke from the machine?" "Don't worry! I'll buy!" I hear these phrases almost every time I work. More often than not, we are all working two jobs or paying our way through school. We are all tired and pushing with everything we have to provide excellent customer service, so it is important that we are all kept peppy and awake. We check each other and smile and provide when we need a little extra caffeine to get through.

4. We dance!

And shake our butts. Sometimes we have big singalongs in the store. It's fun and uplifting. It also allows us to blow off some steam when a small child comes in and destroys a display.

3. We all get sick together.

I wish I was joking about this. It's foolproof that if one of us get sick, it goes around like 3 years olds in Preschool. Typically, what happens, is Patient 0 goes to work and tries to fight through the pain, thus exposing everyone to the "yuck." 24-36 hours later, two more people go down, and so on, until not only has the whole staff cursed the world, but their families have also. Good news is, that when someone calls out, the first few who are now feeling better fill in shifts. Those people who need the extra cash jump up to score an extra shift. Everyone comes to work with bags of migrane meds, cough drops, throat spray, essential oils, OTC pain killers, anti diahrreals, and tampons. It's like a communal "feel better" co-op.

2. We hug.

Things happen during the holiday season; good and bad. People go through divorces, fail a class, people don't see their children awake for days, and dogs have to be put down. We are surrounded by "joy and good cheer" from 8am to 11pm, and just can not allow that to show to the customers. We hug and smile at each other. We grab someone's hand and squeeze. We are each other's sholder on a 15 minute break, and a shrinks during closing.

1. These people become real friends.

Some of the most true, selfless, and kind friends of mine have come from working retail during the holidays. They have taught me lessions about love and compassion that I may have never gotten anywhere else. We play Cards Against Humanity until the early hours of the morning. Our kids run around together. We share disgusting sock habits.They know secrets about me no one else knows. We struggle together and laugh off the absurdities of the day.

So, next time you go into a store during the holidays, know the people working are not just strangers selling you stuff. We are a team and I, for one, appreciate every single one of them far more than you will ever know.