When I was eight years old, my parents opened a restaurant in Pompano Beach, Florida. The eponymously named "Marandola's" served a somewhat more upscale fare, but was still home to many Italian favorites. The restaurant was frequented by a great many tough looking Italian men who came in singly or in variously sized groups. All of these men seemed to be friends of my father's and all of them seemed to have come from New York, New Jersey or Philadelphia; their accents reminiscent of Brooklyn and South Philly. My parents used to think it was cute to have me take baskets of bread out to the tables, where I would get tipped a dollar or five and then the dago bastards would always tousle my hair and call me "Stevie". For a little kid, it was a pretty lucrative racket, but I really despised having my hair tousled and being called "Stevie". As time went on, I started doing more and more around the restaurant; hosting, bussing tables, washing dishes, even a bit of cooking, here and there, but I never waited tables and I never wanted to.
Eventually, my parents sold the restaurant, but my experience there paid off and enabled me to land a job bussing tables at another restaurant. The skills that I learned working for my parents and what I have added to my skillset over time have come in handy many times and served me well, over the years.
When I was around seventeen, I had a job in the kitchen of a restaurant at a motel named The Colonial Inn, located in Sunny Isles, Florida. The motel and many others like it were a haven for all of the snowbirds who would flock down from the Northeast US and Canada, escaping the cold and spending the winter months in sunny South Florida. Depending upon the time of day, I would either be cooking, bussing tables, washing dishes or cleaning the kitchen. The pay was shit and the owner, Jeff, was cheap as hell and a complete douchebag to work for, but I got back at him by fucking his daughter Penny, who worked as the hostess and cashier. Quid pro quo, motherfucker. Quid pro quo.
One day, the restaurant was packed and two of the waitresses hadn't shown up for work. There was a huge line at the door, the kitchen was slammed, we were out of clean dishes on the line and I ran back to the dish area to get the dishwasher going. Suddenly, Jeff walked up to me and I'll never forget the words that he said to me, "We're short in the dining room. I need you to start waiting tables. You're cleaner and more presentable than the other guy is and you know what goes on in the front of the house."
Jeff thrust some shit at me.
"Here's a pen and a pack of checks. Penny will tell you which tables are yours and she'll help you as much as she can. Don't fuck this up."
I was stunned. I stared at Jeff, bewildered.
"What the fuck are you waiting for?" Jeff asked me. "Get the fuck out there and start taking tables. You're gonna' fuck this up. Don't fuck this up."
Asshole.
I walked out into the dining room and it was complete pandemonium. Penny walked right up to me, grabbed my arm and pointed at a table.
"Start with that one," Penny said. "Ask them what they'd like to drink, write it down, get their drinks and take their order. Now! Go!
With that said, Penny smacked my ass and pushed me toward the table.
I nervously approached the table and introduced myself. Sitting before me were three older ladies and an older gentleman. They all had thick Germanic accents. I knew the type and knew that they were going to be very demanding. Great, just fucking great. They ordered three hot teas for the ladies and coffee, for the gentleman. Moments later, I discovered just how much I hate making hot tea for other people; it's a huge pain in the ass, incredibly time consuming and it's the bane of my fucking existence. I've always said a silent prayer at tables with old people, "Please don't order hot tea. Please don't order hot tea."
The power of prayer...
I pray and I pray.
The power of prayer, my ass. It never fucking works. They always order hot tea. There is no god.
People who order hot fucking chocolate are even worse. Hot chocolate? Seriously? What are you, five years old? Seriously. If you're an adult and you want hot chocolate, stay the fuck home and make it yourself, you entitled fucking asshole.
Unless you are under ten years old, don't even try to order that shit from me. If you're a kid, I'll happily make hot chocolate for you. If you're an adult, I'll either tell you that we don't have it, or I'll put the water in the cup, dump in the powder and cover that shit with whipped cream. There's no way in hell that I'm stirring that shit for you, I'm not your bitch. Hot chocolate. Fuck you.
Now you know two things that will really piss your server off. Wield this knowledge wisely.
I brought their drinks back to the table, took their dinner order and then dropped the check off in the kitchen.
Jeff looks at me and says, "Don't fuck this up."
Gee, thanks for the vote of fucking confidence, douchebag.
I walked back out into the dining room and Penny tells me that I have three more tables and that I need to hurry, because she's about to seat me more. I started to panic a little, because I totally wasn't ready for that shit. This was a sink or swim moment and I wasn't ready to drown just yet. My entire attitude changed to "Fuck it", an attitude that I've managed to carry with me up until this very day and one that I expect to serve me for years to come. I calmly went about my business, as long as you define calmly as me, running my ass off and trying to figure out just what the hell I'm supposed to be doing and somehow, in supposed to be doing all of this on the fly. Yup, sounds like complete and utter calm to me.
Thankfully, I'm a lazy fucker and laziness need breeds efficiency and makes for great organizational skills. I stayed afloat and managed not to screw anything up too badly. I was all like, "I got this shit," and shit and I was starting to feel a bit cocky about it.
By this time, the old folks had finished their meal and I cleared away their dirty dishes and took those back to the kitchen. I returned to the table and I offered them dessert, which they declined. They did ask for more coffee and hot water for tea, which, as I'm sure you can tell, had me absolutely jumping for joy. It's a good thing for Joy that she jumped first.
As I was pouring the coffee and hot water, the older gentleman asked me to bring a large bowl of hot water with lemons to the table. I was a little confused by his request and I asked him to be a little more specific. He became very agitated and he told me, in a very rude and demeaning tone, to just bring him a large bowl, full of boiling water and to throw in some lemons,
I walked back into the kitchen, still a little confused, but I did as he asked. The only bowls that we had in the restaurant were these big ass soup bowls, so I took one, filled it with boiling water, tossed in a few lemons. set it all on a tray and carried it out into the dining room.
As I approached the table, I stumbled and I watched in slow motion horror as the tray flipped over, the bowl of hot water went flying, upended and landed directly in the old guy's lap.
I recovered my balance and stood there, mortified.
The old guy jumped up and the bowl took flight once again, crashing to the floor, where it shattered into a thousand pieces of flying shrapnel. I looked at the old man, horrified, but then I noticed that he looked as if he had pissed himself. I couldn't help myself; I started laughing. And laughing. I had completely lost it.
Funny, I was doing that just about an hour ago...
"Yeah, about that..." I thought to myself, "Tomorrow, when I'm cooking your food, I'm going to poison you, you motherfucker. At the very least, I'm going to rub your fucking pancakes all over my balls."
I was still laughing. I couldn't stop and the old man just kept getting angrier and that only made me laugh harder.
I tried to apologize, but the old guy shut me right down. He was royally pissed off and throwing an epic temper tantrum. Not knowing what else to do, I walked back into the kitchen, composed myself and told Jeff my version of what had happened, which was, of course, the unimpeachable truth.
"Jesus Christ," Jeff said disgustedly, "I told you not to fuck it up and here you went and fucked it up."
Jeff ran into the dining room and went to the table.
Yeah, fuck you too, jefe.
I don't know what it was that Jeff said to the old bastard, but when I went back to the table to drop off the check, the old man apologized to me for his outburst, said that accidents happen and that a change of pants didn't mean the end of the world. He thanked me for my service, paid the check and told me to keep the change, To my complete shock, he had left me a twenty dollar tip on a fifty dollar check. I was elated.
The rest of the day went smoothly and I ended up making a lot of money. Jeff was so pleased with my performance that he permanently made me a waiter and gave me all of the best shifts and my income doubled. I'm still not sure if that was a promotion or a demotion, but I do know that night, a legend was born, even if it was just in my own mind.
I kept fucking his daughter, too.
I love a job with benefits.
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