You'll come too, little Indian-giver.
Lately, I’m a quitter.
Not two days ago, I quit my second job in a month here in Beachtown. A job at a supercool restaurant here in town that absolutely everyone loves and which employs the supercoolest most beautiful people and serves the best food and plays the best music.
I quit after one night.
Before that, I quit a job at my favorite coffeeshop here in Beachtown. I quit after two and a half weeks. I gave two weeks’ notice, and then I reneged on that, one fine Saturday morning. Apologized to the owner but said I just couldn’t work another shift; sorry.
Last week I told a gal that I’d discussed moving in with that I’d changed my mind. Then I pulled out of working at this summer teaching camp I’d crossed my fingers to get a position at. Finally, there was yesterday, when I asked for and got back this intricate Christmas gift I’d crafted up for this person who failed to appreciate much of anything I'd ever given.
I’ve become commitment-phobic about every single aspect of life. I’m terrified of becoming trapped in a situation that doesn’t sit well with me. Of entanglement. Of having my spirits broken. So I bow out at the very first indication of discomfort. Which of course, translates to the rest of the world as flakiness. And in this interpretation, the rest of the world may very well be right.
About those jobs, though.
What makes quitting the job at Beautiful People Restaurant so damn cringe-y is that I gained it through a favor by a friend of friend. For what other earthly reason would B.P. hire some 29-year-old non-Beautiful Person who’s never worked in a restaurant in her life?
Still, I wasn’t too worried. All the bartenders I knew at B.P. were super-nice. The manager was super-nice, too. The day she hired me, she joked a lot about how easy it is to be a hostess. Leaning in, she told me, “Honestly? Most of our hostesses don’t have two brain cells to rub together. I don’t think you’ll have a problem.”
It wasn’t till my first night that I met the first non-supernice people. That’d be, of course, the principle folks with whom hostesses have to interact, a.k.a., the servers. Turns out that the servers at B.P. all hate the hostesses, precisely because they hold the opinion the supernice manager had already shared: that the hostesses at B.P. are all about as dumb as rocks.
I feel kind of silly telling you about what crystallized things. I’ve worked in food service before and I know that when you’re busy, there’s not much time for pleasantries, and I don’t particularly expect ‘em. That’s one thing. And when you’re making money, to some extent, who cares? If I had been making money, the birthday cake thing definitely wouldn’t have mattered.
The birthday cake was one that a customer had brought. The hostess who was training me told me to take it back to the walk-in, and make sure to tell that table’s server about it. Okay, I thought: Tell the server, tell the server. What was her name, again…? When I got back, we were officially Slammed and, dumb hostess that I was, I forgot all about the cake, until an hour later, when a different server came up to our hostess podium.
“So, Candi had a birthday cake at her table, and no one told her? Not okay,” she said to the hostess who was training me.
“Oh. That’s completely my fault,” I said, my stomach sinking. Three hours, and something in the air in this place was already causing me to become one of these Stupid Hostesses. Geez.
The server looked from the hostess training me, back to me, slightly deflated. See, she was actually mad because she and another waitress were convinced they were getting stiffed of all the good tables.
“Well,” she said, still looking at the other hostess. “You can’t do that. It looks really bad.” She dumped a pile of menus onto our podium and stormed off.
Not five minutes later, the second waitress who thought she was being stiffed came over.
“Okay, listen: When a server isn’t told there’s a birthday cake,” she said, “that causes big problems-”
“Oh, sorry, that’s my fault,” I cut in. “Totally my fault.” She continued as if I hadn’t said anything.
“When a server doesn’t know there’s a cake, it makes her look really bad in front of her table. You can’t forget to tell her!”
“Won’t happen again,” I said, already more annoyed than apologetic. The server wasn’t even looking at me. And Jesus, I thought. If she’d gonna be this pissy at this hostess, who seemed to me to be doing the very best, decidedly non-stupid, job possible, what was I in for when I started working solo, the very next shift?
During points of the evening when we weren’t busy, the servers huddled together in the restaurant’s opposite corner, talking. No one came by to say hello.
Later, I managed to track down the server whom I’d been told had been so humiliated. When I apologized about the cake, she shrugged. “Oh. It’s really not a big deal,” she said.
I felt like I was inside Kitchen Confidential. I’d read about such weird restaurant staff hierarchies, but lord if I wanted such things to actually start to matter to me at this stage in my life. Not for 6.15 an hour plus an average tip-out per busy weekend night of twelve bucks. So, yeah. I called the supernice manager the next day, and I quit.
But first-!
The coffeeshop was 6.15 an hour, too. It’s my favorite place in town: an independent coffeeshop that also makes excellent sandwiches and soups. That works on such a barebones budget, it can’t afford to hire more than one person per shift. This means you never stop working, making sandwiches and milkshakes and smoothies for tourists who don’t tip, making chicken salad and roasting coffee. It means you are always behind and always closing an hour late, for which you do not get paid overtime, and you begin to get a sore throat from the roaster, which smokes up the backroom something awful. And you’re making lattes and mochas for people which you know you could do in your damn sleep because you’ve done it before, in your early twenties. Only you made more money at that job.
You can’t sleep well. Something about the coffee oil that sticks to your skin and hair, even after you shower, and you lie in bed and smell that smell, which reminds you of your early twenties and the feeling of futility.
Even before you quit, you decide you will never work in a coffeeshop again.
Lately, I’m a quitter.
Not two days ago, I quit my second job in a month here in Beachtown. A job at a supercool restaurant here in town that absolutely everyone loves and which employs the supercoolest most beautiful people and serves the best food and plays the best music.
I quit after one night.
Before that, I quit a job at my favorite coffeeshop here in Beachtown. I quit after two and a half weeks. I gave two weeks’ notice, and then I reneged on that, one fine Saturday morning. Apologized to the owner but said I just couldn’t work another shift; sorry.
Last week I told a gal that I’d discussed moving in with that I’d changed my mind. Then I pulled out of working at this summer teaching camp I’d crossed my fingers to get a position at. Finally, there was yesterday, when I asked for and got back this intricate Christmas gift I’d crafted up for this person who failed to appreciate much of anything I'd ever given.
I’ve become commitment-phobic about every single aspect of life. I’m terrified of becoming trapped in a situation that doesn’t sit well with me. Of entanglement. Of having my spirits broken. So I bow out at the very first indication of discomfort. Which of course, translates to the rest of the world as flakiness. And in this interpretation, the rest of the world may very well be right.
About those jobs, though.
What makes quitting the job at Beautiful People Restaurant so damn cringe-y is that I gained it through a favor by a friend of friend. For what other earthly reason would B.P. hire some 29-year-old non-Beautiful Person who’s never worked in a restaurant in her life?
Still, I wasn’t too worried. All the bartenders I knew at B.P. were super-nice. The manager was super-nice, too. The day she hired me, she joked a lot about how easy it is to be a hostess. Leaning in, she told me, “Honestly? Most of our hostesses don’t have two brain cells to rub together. I don’t think you’ll have a problem.”
It wasn’t till my first night that I met the first non-supernice people. That’d be, of course, the principle folks with whom hostesses have to interact, a.k.a., the servers. Turns out that the servers at B.P. all hate the hostesses, precisely because they hold the opinion the supernice manager had already shared: that the hostesses at B.P. are all about as dumb as rocks.
I feel kind of silly telling you about what crystallized things. I’ve worked in food service before and I know that when you’re busy, there’s not much time for pleasantries, and I don’t particularly expect ‘em. That’s one thing. And when you’re making money, to some extent, who cares? If I had been making money, the birthday cake thing definitely wouldn’t have mattered.
The birthday cake was one that a customer had brought. The hostess who was training me told me to take it back to the walk-in, and make sure to tell that table’s server about it. Okay, I thought: Tell the server, tell the server. What was her name, again…? When I got back, we were officially Slammed and, dumb hostess that I was, I forgot all about the cake, until an hour later, when a different server came up to our hostess podium.
“So, Candi had a birthday cake at her table, and no one told her? Not okay,” she said to the hostess who was training me.
“Oh. That’s completely my fault,” I said, my stomach sinking. Three hours, and something in the air in this place was already causing me to become one of these Stupid Hostesses. Geez.
The server looked from the hostess training me, back to me, slightly deflated. See, she was actually mad because she and another waitress were convinced they were getting stiffed of all the good tables.
“Well,” she said, still looking at the other hostess. “You can’t do that. It looks really bad.” She dumped a pile of menus onto our podium and stormed off.
Not five minutes later, the second waitress who thought she was being stiffed came over.
“Okay, listen: When a server isn’t told there’s a birthday cake,” she said, “that causes big problems-”
“Oh, sorry, that’s my fault,” I cut in. “Totally my fault.” She continued as if I hadn’t said anything.
“When a server doesn’t know there’s a cake, it makes her look really bad in front of her table. You can’t forget to tell her!”
“Won’t happen again,” I said, already more annoyed than apologetic. The server wasn’t even looking at me. And Jesus, I thought. If she’d gonna be this pissy at this hostess, who seemed to me to be doing the very best, decidedly non-stupid, job possible, what was I in for when I started working solo, the very next shift?
During points of the evening when we weren’t busy, the servers huddled together in the restaurant’s opposite corner, talking. No one came by to say hello.
Later, I managed to track down the server whom I’d been told had been so humiliated. When I apologized about the cake, she shrugged. “Oh. It’s really not a big deal,” she said.
I felt like I was inside Kitchen Confidential. I’d read about such weird restaurant staff hierarchies, but lord if I wanted such things to actually start to matter to me at this stage in my life. Not for 6.15 an hour plus an average tip-out per busy weekend night of twelve bucks. So, yeah. I called the supernice manager the next day, and I quit.
But first-!
The coffeeshop was 6.15 an hour, too. It’s my favorite place in town: an independent coffeeshop that also makes excellent sandwiches and soups. That works on such a barebones budget, it can’t afford to hire more than one person per shift. This means you never stop working, making sandwiches and milkshakes and smoothies for tourists who don’t tip, making chicken salad and roasting coffee. It means you are always behind and always closing an hour late, for which you do not get paid overtime, and you begin to get a sore throat from the roaster, which smokes up the backroom something awful. And you’re making lattes and mochas for people which you know you could do in your damn sleep because you’ve done it before, in your early twenties. Only you made more money at that job.
You can’t sleep well. Something about the coffee oil that sticks to your skin and hair, even after you shower, and you lie in bed and smell that smell, which reminds you of your early twenties and the feeling of futility.
Even before you quit, you decide you will never work in a coffeeshop again.
Labels: slaving away
posted by Alice at 4:27 PM
2 Comments:
sometimes you have to do what is best for yourself. and then do your best to forgive yourself for doing it.
there will always be another barrista or another hostess. and they hired you because you're pretty darn cute. and cool. don't doubt that. they wouldn't have picked you if were weren't the "face" they were looking for to greet the clientele.
work on the forgiveness. i'm working on that right now too.
Hey there, I don't think that's necessarily flaky -- it sounds like you're making a lot of new realizations out there in Beachtown, and you're changing course. If you knew how many people quit their jobs in the first week, I think you'd feel a lot better -- it's extremely common! Even in cushy, non-roaster-throat-burning corporate America!
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