Six years ago, I waited tables at Red Lobster in Poughkeepsie, New York. It was the third restaurant I worked at since entering the workforce at the
If you have never worked in the restaurant industry, let me share a quick summary of my experience: every good day trumps every bad day, and every good table of guests makes the worst all the more bearable.
There were times when a table of six would run me to death. More biscuits. Sweet tea. Ranch dressing. I fulfilled requests with an urgent haste, but the $1 tip did little to show respect for the to and fro of someone making $2.15 an hour (this wage was permissible in 2010 and may even still be).
Today I sat in a restaurant in Chicago O'Hare airport. My waitress was a familiar stranger. I knew her face, but it was the first time we met.
The vertigo of a peak had me visiting a valley. I was scrawling out reminders to myself to be kind, to appreciate, to compliment, because these are the actions often forgotten en route to the top.
I wrote something very simple on my receipt, "Thank you - you have a beautiful smile!"
The public consciousness was at play, because my waitress thought the man who told her to smile was the one who left the note.
As she was wrapping up her shift, her remaining words included the word "beautiful" many times.
"Have a beautiful weekend!"
"Have a beautiful stay!"
"Thank you, and have a beautiful time."
Future self: remember to compliment. You will make more than one person's day.
