The sexism you experience when you work as a waitress

It was an impossibly humid evening in Ohio and I was collecting one of my last paychecks at my summer job as a waitress before returning to university. I can still remember what I was wearing on that dog day of summer. Jean shorts, a tank top and a pair of sandals.

Approaching the restaurant’s entrance, my stomach stirred at the thought of how I might be perceived in anything but my unflattering, ketchup-smattered apron. For a moment, I contemplated whether or not I was being unreasonable. Surely the predominantly male kitchen staff were capable of composing themselves. After all, they were grown men. Not animals.

I stood paralyzed in the parking lot for another half second before jogging back to the car, and quickly thrusting my arms through the sleeves of a suede jacket in my backseat. It was 82 degrees.

I have been working in restaurants since I was 14 years old. First I was a bus-girl at my uncle’s restaurant until I left for university, and then I waitressed and bartended at various places every summer since. While maintaining those positions, I have been subjected to more flagrant acts of sexism and sexual harassment than I have anywhere else; an unsettling fact considering that I was underage for the majority of my years spent in these establishments. The blame cannot be placed so much on the customers, but rather my fellow employees and perhaps more disturbingly, my employers.

The day I collected my paycheck, I entered the kitchen to grant my co-workers a brief, ‘hello’ before making my way to the office in the next room. Before the revolving door even stood still, every last line-cook and dishwasher had trained their undivided attention on me. I hugged my jacket to my waist as they found their words.

“Damn, baby. Need some help with those shorts?”

“Why don’t you show those legs more often?”

“Come over here and smile pretty for daddy!”

I was shepherded into the office closely followed by flashes on phone cameras.

Fortunately, the manager on duty that night was alerted of the commotion and as I reentered the kitchen to leave, jacket pulled securely to my chest, paycheck in hand, I was pleased that he had seemingly rushed to my aid. According to him, the pictures on the phones of two of my co-workers had been deleted. But not before he complimented my figure in them.

Not only had those men barely been reprimanded. But their actions were justified.

He truly believed that he was extending me some sort of kindness, and that he had done more than enough to assuage the situation. It would be the first of many occasions that I would be disappointed in my boss.

When I first received a waitressing application, I was told that I would need to include any and all experience I had in customer service. I was told that upon possible acceptance, I would need proper training to work not only with, but for people. I was told that the customer would always be right, no matter the circumstance.

But I was not told that I would often feel threatened by my co-workers, or that engaging in inappropriate flirtations, and wearing more makeup would be synonymous with a more harmonious work environment. I was not told that my fellow female waitresses not only adhered to these rules, but came to depend on them.

I was not told that I would learn to lie for my fellow employees, fielding phone calls from the disgruntled wives of managers and line-cooks, reciting into the receiver, “No, he was not with (insert waitress’ name here) last night at the bar. I think he was with the guys from the kitchen.”

I was not told that if I happened to spend more time on my hair before a shift that all of my orders would miraculously be filled and presented to me with machine-like efficiency. Or that in the event that I made a mistake, my boss would grant me a hug that lingers too long to be considered comforting, an unsolicited pat on the backside, or a sickeningly sympathetic, “You’re doing a great job, sweetheart.” I was not told that if I arrived to work sans smile, I would be asked if I was on my period that week. And I was certainly not told that one day, pictures of me would be taken by my co-workers without my permission.

For many years I wondered if I had been warned of those things whether or not I would have opted for another type of part-time job. I naively assumed if I were to be hired in an office position that I might find a more comfortable environment. Of course, I learned otherwise when I eventually did.

I was hopeful. My boss was a woman.

On my first day, after I had been introduced to everyone in the office, I began the atypical duties of a secretary: filing, composing spread sheets, answering phones. As I walked to a colleague’s office to deliver something, I found that he was not behind his desk. But instead, gathered with nearly every male from the department in the break room gossiping. About me.

“She’s a nice girl, but you can tell she’s got a dirty side. Did you see her wrist tattoos?”

I listened from the corridor for as long as I could, attempting to distinguish the voices from one another. But when I heard my boss’ joining in as though she were one of them, it was time for me to walk away. I had never been more excited to see a summer end.

For a significant period of my adulthood, I clung to the notion that once I entered a more serious line of work, the kind of treatment I experienced while waitressing would no longer be possible. Even more so if I was fortunate enough to have a female boss. The fact that I was wrong remains to be the uncomfortable truth that I am forced to confront upon entering every place of professionalism since.

I realize that I am only 22 and I am unable to make sweeping generalizations given the number of experiences I’ve had thus far. There will be many more opportunities for me to be proven wrong. And I truly hope that some day I am.

Yet looking critically at these incidents, I cannot help but wonder what hope do I, and all other women have for comfortably navigating the workforce? How many women have become a casualty of the colleagues’ maltreatment? Of their boss’? According to a 2014 study by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, nearly 30 thousand. But what about the incidents that go unreported?

How many continue to justify their experiences with the outdated adage that it is not considered sexual harassment or maltreatment, it’s just called life?