The Waiter Chronicles: Last Day

It is the last day today. In at 10:30 to open, serve lunch, and then it's over. It's not an ending I ever expected to be very thoughtful about, and yet I'm finding myself a little sad. The cast of characters that has made up my life these last seven months will stay in place, doing what they do, but I won't be there to enjoy it.

Yet, neither will I be there to suffer from it.

I've got Angry Chef's phone number in my contact list, and a couple of times this week I've thought that I should call him up, give him a proper farewell. I've not seen or heard from him since that blurry December night when he told me what to do with myself and then disappeared into the night, never to be heard from again. I don't know if I'll pursue that thought.

I've gone so far as to assemble a playlist to burn for Pepe, but I don't have any cd's, so it'll probably not see the light of day. That's okay. There's something a little bit forced about somebody like myself forcing music onto a 21 year old dynamo like Pepe, even if it does arise out of a genuine desire to share something good.

I stopped by a little boutique on the way home yesterday to pick up a little something for The Owners. I'd had in mind for awhile that I would leave them with a chalice and plate set, a quasi theological statement about their restaurant as a shared table where people are welcomed and find, em, communion. But those are a lot more expensive than I'd realized. In the end I settled an a small iron cross that I hope will make a contribution to the life of the place.

Waiterrant wrote awhile back that the restaurant world "can be like a comfortable womb" for those who work in it. You come at the start of your shift, and you leave at the end. What's expected of you is constant. You don't have health benefits or weekends, but it's predictable and safe; at times, the cash is fantastic. I never envisioned anything other than a thoughtless and sudden transition out of this "womb," yet I suspect that the coming days and weeks will have their moments of . . . something--nostalgia, maybe?

That'll be for the good. It will mean that this experience has been good. Which is worlds away from what I thought it would be when I wrote this:

"It occurred to me as I walked home this afternoon that I don't need this. Ten years ago I would have seen it as a test of character. I would have regarded the breaking glasses and the raging inferiority complex as a sort of challenge to be overcome. To ingratiate myself to those people by proving myself minimally competent, even good, at what I was hired to do would have become a measure of my abilities. I would endure it to prove to myself that I could. But I don't need to do that anymore. I don't need to prove anything to myself, at least not as it pertains to balancing dishes on a tray. I so don't need this.

Only I do. Because otherwise I'm unemployed, and somehow that seems worse than this. But not by much.

Ciao.

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The Waiter Chronicles: Bon Natale

Christmas Eve at the Ristorante was carried along by an air of other-worldliness. There was an eerie quiet coming from the kitchen, and Angry Chef's absence created an atmosphere of sadness mixed with relief. For me, the place doesn't feel the same without him. But the first hours without him revealed the burden that his temper had placed on everyone.

The dining room was busy all night. Junior jumped back into the kitchen to help cook, and people were pleased with the food. Near the end of the evening, the wife arrived to have her Christmas Eve dinner, and the owner insisted that I order dinner and sit with her, both of us as his guests. Grateful, I complied.

As everyone exchanged Christmas wishes and headed home, the Owner passed out Panettone and Prosecco. We left happy.

It was a Bon Natale indeed.

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The Waiter Chronicles: Angry Chef's Ouster

I'm not sure how it went down, but Angry Chef was fired sometime between 10 pm last night and 12 pm today. Junior just called to tell me the news and to inform me that our eight Christmas Eve reservations (and anyone else who wanders in) will be treated to the culinary stylings of Augusto and Felipe, the two sous chefs. If needed, Junior himself will lend a hand in the kitchen.

Last night's dinner service was not good at all. Around 5:30 several large parties with children arrived at the same time. They were all seated, given drinks and bread, and had their orders taken. As will happen, two parties of eight (one of them mine) had their entrees fired at the same time. That's 16 entrees that need to come out at once. The kitchen doesn't even have 16 pans.

Angry Chef lost it. He had been animated up to that point, but this put him over the edge; he came out of the kitchen yelling, looked at me and pointed, screaming "[expletive deleted] you!" Then he demanded to know where the owner was. I produced the owner, who ambled back into the kitchen with his disgruntled employee, and a loud Italian shouting match ensued.

I'd never seen this before. I'd seen Angry Chef yell; I'd seen the owner yell. I'd never seen them yell at each other. The waiters and bussers did our best to keep moving and ignore the catastrophe in the kitchen. In the end, my party of eight had to wait 45 minutes for their dinner, and I had to offer them free desert. Likewise, Pepe's party of eight waited nearly an hour.

Things settled down after that, but at the Ristorante's expense. The owner had to turn people away, since the kitchen was in such a state. So here he is with a dining room only half full, telling customers he can't seat them. Needless to say, he was not happy. In fact, he would say later that he would have done better to not even open last night.

What happened between then and the phone call I just got I don't know. I suppose the details will be filled in, but I won't be asking for them. The long-and-short of it is that the Ristorante is out its chef.

I feel bad for Angry Chef. He's a far more complicated person than I know, surely, and his flamboyance and temper bespeak some self-destructive habits with [obviously] detrimental results as far as his career is concerned. But he's a genuine guy. He loves good food and wine, and he lives and dies by the integrity of his craft. I had grown quite fond of him, actually. In fact, as we readied the dining room last night, enjoying a little pre-dinner chat, he wistfully told me that he loved me and that he would miss me when I left.

How could he have known that, in less than 24 hours, he would be preceding me in departure?

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The Waiter Chronicles: My Tortured Conscience

I've been a reader of waiterrant for about six months now. After a dicey situation tonight, I sent The Waiter an email seeking advice or absolution. Here, in full, is the text of the email. Please feel free to respond.

"Waiter,

I'm a waiter of only six month's experience. One of the things I learned early on is the stratification of the restaurant social system, with the bussers, waiters, and kitchen staff all occupying their respective roles. As a waiter, my place is secure. But tonight I got myself into a situation that I wasn't prepared for and that may have called my loyalty into question.

After a steady and busy night when nothing went wrong and everybody loved their food, I walked into the kitchen to retrieve some silverware for polishing. While there, I decided to applaud the kitchen staff. I simply stopped, looked at the chef, the sous chef, and the food prep. cook, and I applauded. Literally, I clapped my hands in acknowledgement. It turns out they were in the process of cooking some food for themselves and the dishwashers, and after my gesture of appreciation the chef ordered, in Espanol, that a plate be made for me. I made like I didn't understand and left. Normally, the kitchen will make plates for the waiters as well.

A few minutes later I went back into the kitchen, and the waiter told me to come and enjoy a plate with him and the rest of the kitchen. He also offered me a glass of wine and some mussels he had cooked up. I quickly realized that there was going to be no food for the waiters; the stoves were off. Yet, to refuse this unusual offer would be to offend the chef in a very serious way. So, while my waiter colleagues polished glasses and set tables on empty stomachs, I wolfed down a salmon filet and caeser salad, standing at the chef's side. I also slurped a few mussels. I made quick work of it, then earnestly thanked him in Italian and returned to the bussing station. I felt so bad about what I had done that I actually confided in a couple of the waiters about what had happened and sort of half apologized. They didn't get any food at all.

I fell like I have violated some fraternal loyalty among waiters. But would it have been any better to offend the chef?

Please help ease my conscience.

Not Prince Hamlet

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The Waiter Chronicles: Sree Thparkling Waters

They just kept coming. Couples, families, dates, reunions: you name the group it was at the Ristorante tonight, the second night of dear city's "Festival of Lights."

With four waiters and one busser, things got out of hand pretty quickly, and they stayed that way for nearly two hours. With a private party of 30 people tying up Grandpa and the busser, it fell to Junior, Pepe, and I to manage the rest of the dining room. Needless to say, Pepe and Junior did a much better job than I did.

I had things under control, for the most part, with my party of eight working on their desserts and my various other parties of two and four settling in. But then walked in another party of eight, this one with a child, and where do you think they were going to sit? "No problem," I though. "Just get it done."

So off I went to make Shirley Temples and prepare bread and rehearse the whole list of holiday specials. Then the other party of eight urgently needed their bill. Then they urgently needed to split their bill over five separate credit cards. Then the wheels fell off. Flummoxed by the separation of checks, I started forgetting things: bruschetta, wine, bread--my gosh the bread! My speech skills deteriorated rapidly, since what was coming out of my mouth couldn't hardly keep up with what was motoring around my head.

It hurt me. One table waited too long for their bill and penalized me by tipping at about 7% (of their $140 ticket). That I can handle. The really bad part is that the sort-of truce that had endured between Angry Chef and the wait staff completely fell apart, and he started yelling and swearing at people. One family came in and ordered an appetizer, two entrees, and a dessert all at the same time. When I explained that the order was okay because it was a family, he responded with, "That's nice. F*** you. F*** your family."

This is what weekends will be like for the next month. I can only hope that I'll get better at it. Or that we hire some more waiters.

It had better be the former; I'm not holding my breath on the latter.

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The Practitioner

I got a great haircut today.

I mean, a great haircut. I look in the mirror and I think, "Wow. Why didn't I do this before?"

It's short, but not defiantly so. The part is right where it should be, and the top blends seamlessly into the sides of my rectangular head. It's the haircut of a lifetime.

And what's most remarkable is that the barber never once asked me how to cut it.

When he first started attacking the overgrowth in the back with his clippers without a word, I but looking for. It was only after he grabbed his scissors, oiled their hinges, and took the first crunching rip off the top of the mop that I was certain: he wasn't waiting for my input.

It was too late to protest by the time I awakened to reality. Anyways, there was something liberating about it, about not having to force a vague description of how I want my hair to look (it's a no-win scenario: too much demanding detail makes you a prima donna; not enough and you're likely to hear, "Then what are you here for?").

The barber snipped and pulled and clipped for about twenty minutes. His movements were sharp and decisive, brisk. When he was done we both knew that some serious work had just been done.

The whole experience set me to thinking about the practitioners among us, those men and women who practice a craft, a craft they have honed over years of experience. Like Angry Chef.
Angry Chef knows how your food should be prepared, and so he doesn't need to hear about the intricacies of your tastes. Because nobody should have the meat sauce on their pasta, even if they ask for it. The practitioner knows enough to be revolted at the very thought of it.

The barber didn't need my input to cut my hair because he could see what needed done. He was able to size up the boxy shape of my skull. assess the length of the locks, and cut until it looked right. Any direction I would have given would have only made his job more difficult.

So much of where our technological society is going is toward the tastes and interests of individual consumers. Take just about any product or service, and you can customize it however you want. The consumer is becoming the producer. That's the idea behind a blog, isn't it? And YouTube? And Wikipedia? Fast Food (ala Burger King's "Have it your way")? Indeed, the very idea of the "professional," the "expert," is being challenged on all fronts, from religion to politics to art to commerce.

But there remain those professional, expert practitioners among us. And they know that the collective intelligence of Wikipedia is a sorry substitute for the well-developed eye and the trained palate. To the practitioner, you can have it your way if you like. But you'd better not. You're better off letting the practitioner do it her way.

Because that's the right way.

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The Waiter Chronicles: Separate Checks

Tonight I waited on a party of 10 people, all men, and all seeming to be from out of town, visiting for some kind of convention. They informed me from the start that they'd be ordering on separate checks, a fact that made me a little nervous because I haven't yet had to handle that. But you gotta do it, right?

So they each ordered a beer. Then they each ordered a pasta--that's 10 different pastas. Then five ordered a dessert, while six ordered coffee. In the meantime several had second and even third beers. When it came time to split up their checks I was a mess. I had taken copious notes during their orders, but I wasn't the one who got the second and third beers. I was randomly assigning beers to guys who may or may not have drank them.

In the end there was only one mistake, and it was easily corrected. But here's the fun part: Only two of these 10 guys paid with a debit card. The rest paid with exact change. And I mean change. Eight separate collections of bills and coins. I couldn't bring myself to count each person's money and check it against their bill, so I just collected it all up and handed the stack of tickets to the owner, preemptively apologizing for any short tickets.

"What are these guys?" she asked. "Engineers?"

It could have been a lot worse. The Angry Chef assures me it will be.

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The Waiter Chronicles: Angry Chef

"Six months ago I would have kicked your [expletive deleted] ass. Then I would have kicked him out of the restaurant. I didn't train twenty years for this!"

The chef is gesticulating wildly, glaring at me and raising his voice, even as he excuses my taking of a bad order.

The gentleman wanted the antelope, which is served either with a nice porcini mushroom sauce or a lovely fig port wine sauce and comes with some roasted potatoes. The gentleman opted for the fig port wine sauce, only, he didn't want the potatoes, he wanted penne pasta. When asked what kind of sauce he would like on the pasta, he looked confused.

"I thought we decided on that. I said I wanted the fig port wine sauce."

"Oh," I explained, "that sauce comes on the antelope. You can pick a pasta sauce for the penne, like a pomodoro sauce or a carbonara--" he cut me off.

"Let's just do the same sauce on the pasta as is on the antelope."

Now, that seemed weird to me. But I figured I should give the guy what he wanted. Wrong move. As soon as I showed it to the chef, he clenched his fists and exclaimed, "F-ing disguisting!"

Chalk it up to learning: don't let people put a sweet sauce meant for meat on their pasta.

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