Get rid of your stereotypes: There’s no shame in being a waitress

It is one thing to serve, and another entirely to be a servant. There is no shame in waiting tables, cleaning houses, landscaping, or washing dishes: they are honest forms of making a living in a world where dishonest profits are so often easier. I grew up in a blue-collar family, so this was embedded into my view of the world.

But Stanford, for all its acceptance and open-mindedness, has a funny way of making us feel like we’re better than the rest.

In waitressing mode

In my freshman year at Stanford, I never felt more empowered. I had been surrounded by those who shared my intellectual curiosity and academic standards, and got used to the seemingly endless luxuries (they might not always feel like luxuries, but trust me, a quiet and expansive library like Green is an envied comfort). I felt I’d reached the next step in my journey, one that afforded me the indulgences of a higher class, to whom many of my new peers already belonged.

As summer drew nearer, I realized I would be unable to take part in the internships I had been accepted for, because they gave (at the very most) a small living stipend. While Stanford’s financial aid is more than generous, even the small contribution my family was expected to make is impossible, and I needed a paying job to make sure I could return for a sophomore year.

I moved back to Florida to stay with my ailing mother, finding two hostess/waitressing jobs at a nearby luxury beach resort. Having inducted myself into that imaginary society of people who can “do anything they set their minds to,” I quickly realized my qualifications bore little use outside the classroom or laboratory.

Fourteen hour days studying at your desk are incomparable to fourteen hour days on your feet in a restaurant, often with no break to sit, eat, or use the restroom. You are expected to know how to accommodate impossible requests, take responsibility for faults of others, prevent unavoidable inconveniences, listen attentively to drunken monologues, and smile at handsy flirts.

Even if you can swallow your pride enough to accomplish these tasks, aggressive complaints are inevitable. So often I had more than four tables, and when it took me a minute longer than desirable to bring something to a customer, I could hear them whisper to each other about my incompetence. Worse yet, some were either so intoxicated or stressed from the family vacation that they would take the time to yell at me, spit at me, and call me names that would make my grandmother faint.

All I ever wanted to do was turn and scream, “How dare you? I go to Stanford! The Stanford! And your greatest accomplishment is marrying a man three times your age so you can have the money to mistreat those who serve you! Do you know the sorts of amazing things I was doing just a month ago?!”

But I never said any of that. Instead, I gave them my most sincere insincere smile and apologized for my negligence. More importantly, I learned a valuable lesson: nobody gives a damn that you go to Stanford if you can’t remember to bring napkins to table three.

Colleagues

Apparently checking the radar is not something vacationers are to be troubled with, so when it rained at the outdoor grill, all hell broke loose. My co-workers and I would turn the cranks to lower the protective tarps while guests would congregate in the center, shouting helplessly as if each raindrop was holy water and they were Satan himself. Meanwhile, rain pooled on the tarps and poured onto me like a merciless waterfall, and all the while I’m turning that cursed lever through the agonizing pain running through my shoulders and back. Sunshine State? Not even close.

When there was no seating available in the restaurant, it was my job to explain to irate long-term tenants that our restaurant was first-come, first-serve, and that despite their insistence, it was not within my power to forcefully remove the elderly woman and her four young grandchildren from their favorite table. The responses to this and all other bad news was always vulgar, and sometime neared violence.

To this day, I still have nightmares of the phone ringing for all eternity.

The majority of my coworkers were, like me, just passing through, taking advantage of the summer business at the beach to make some decent pocket change. Some were students, some just moved from one town to the next seeking the highest paying jobs for those without a college degree. For still others, this was their career. Such a concept baffled me at the time. I’d always assumed that waiting tables was a temporary job, meant to hold you over until a better opportunity arose. For many, this was the best they had to hope for, and they were proud of what they’d accomplished.

Quitting wasn’t an option: I needed the money. And evidently, I also needed the reality check. The dirty secrets of the life of luxury I’d always lusted after were being revealed before me in the most grotesque way possible. Any idiot can come into money, the possession itself is nothing to admire. At Stanford we acquire the skills and connections to live prosperous lives, but that prosperity can lead to arrogance, and that arrogance can lead to a disconnect from the real world.

Now on a quarter abroad in Italy

This disconnect was apparent when I returned to campus in the autumn. My peers recited their summer agendas like a resume: I worked in this lab, traveled to that country, researched with Professor XYZ, blah blah blah. Then I told them I spent my summer working two full-time waitressing positions. The looks of disgust are burned into my memory. I’m sure they weren’t intentional, but they were there nonetheless, in all their judgmental glory. It would have been better, to them, if I’d stayed home twiddling my thumbs for three months rather than “degrade” myself to such a state. I deduced from their gaze and passive-aggressive comments that I’d lost some of their respect.

And they lost all of mine.

The next time you’re at a restaurant, or being served by anyone, remember that what looks to you like carelessness is most likely anything but. Minimum wage doesn’t mean minimum effort.

Those were hard times for me, absolutely. But they were formative times, and I am more grounded than ever before. My advice? Don’t be afraid to get your hands dirty, and don’t be afraid to meet the amazing people who do it every day. Even on campus, they’re everywhere. Ask for the names of the employees in the dining hall, don’t just throw your ID card at the person behind the register. Strike up a conversation with the cleaning crew. Compliment the arrangement when you see people setting up for an event. Remind them that we are aware enough to see them as professionals, and nothing less.