Get to Work

“Could you just go away? You’re being really annoying right now.”

What? I didn’t mean to — Apologies fumble out of my mouth in a desperate attempt to salvage what’s left of my tip.

“I’m about to report you to your manager.”

It’s May of 2017, and tears sting the back of my eyes as I turn away from the table and rush down the “employees only” staircase. Only when I have my back safely against the racks in the storage room, with boxes of napkins to my left and styrofoam cups to my right do I let the tears fall down my cheeks.

I only asked her how the pizza was tasting. And now I’m choking on tears, trying to calm the rapid beating of my heart and praying the other waitress will take the rest of my tables while I stay hidden in the basement.

I used to always wear my emotions on my sleeve. If my teacher snapped at me for talking in class, I would tear up. If a classmate accused me of being bossy when working on a project, I would tell them off. Whenever I felt targeted or insulted, my response would be one of two things: cry or yell back.

But ever since I started getting paid to smile at people and always give them what they want — also known as being a waitress — in March of 2017, things have been different. Working in the service industry has allowed me to develop people skills that have proved useful outside of the restaurant — namely keeping my composure when all I want to do is scream into a pillow.

As a waitress, I have to plaster a smile on my face and deliver my signature “Hi, how are you folks doing tonight?” no matter what your ex texted you 10 minutes before you got to work. Things are rarely going perfectly, but if you want to make money, sometimes you have to play pretend.

I’ve bit my tongue as my coworker gave herself three tables in a row (essentially stealing money from me), even though we both know we’re supposed to trade off. I’ve stood silently as customers get heated about other tables’ food coming out first — something not even in my control. I’ve wiped away tears and fixed my smudged mascara in the mirror of my car before walking through the back door of the restaurant with a smile on my face, pretending I hadn’t just been told the song I had to sing the next day wasn’t “audition ready.”

Sometimes, what you’re going through in your personal life is not what’s important or if someone hurt your feelings, especially when it comes to work. What matters is that you have a job to do.

I’ve learned to stay calm and respectful when my current boss is reprimanding me, so when I move on to another career field, I’ll know how to stop myself from yelling back at my superiors. I have learned to do whatever I can to ensure my customers leave with a good impression of me, so when I need to make an investment pitch for my start-up business, I will know exactly what to say to make my potential investor happy. And most importantly, I have learned how to put my personal struggles — from screaming matches with my mom to forgotten words in auditions — in their own compartment in my mind, and seal it shut for six hours.

Even though I have to deal with angry customers (who sometimes forget that their servers are, you know, human), I know this is the best job I could possibly have. Working in the service industry as a high school student has provided me with valuable skills for “the real world” that I couldn’t get anywhere else.

When I first started, I couldn’t take any criticism and every confrontation would end in dramatic, soap-opera-esque tears. Just a year and a half later, I can see the improvements.

“I don’t like this beer. Can I exchange it for a Miller Lite?”

She’s already taken a few sips of her draft beer. We can’t just exchange it out for free. I start to tell her that I’m not sure we can, but she’s quick to interrupt me.

“You can. Ask.”

In fact, I know we can’t. But I take a deep breath, force a tight-lipped smile, and say, “Okay.” And I move on to my next table.