I started bar backing a few months ago. I asked a few friends in the industry and soon landed a gig at an upscale restaurant in the financial district downtown. I have always had a fascination with working in a bar. There was a certain romantic allure in my yet naive ideology. It was a place of fun, unfettered adoration from the customers. You were serving inhibition one glass at a time.On top of my coaching career and studio practice, I would be working two 8 hour shifts on the weekends, rendering my social life pretty much null. However, I went into the new challenge with vigor and positivity, as I was yet unhindered by the brutal truth of being at the very bottom of the pecking order of a service industry institution.
I was thrown into the fire on my first shift alone.
"Coops, Rocks, AP Reds, Bordeaux, Martinis and Mules. The most popular liquors are Four Roses, Ketel, Tangueray, Bulleit. You drink? Yeah? Well, that's good because the last guy who worked here didn't know anything about alcohol."
The restaurant used to be a bank and was retrofitted into a 4 story restaurant and bar serving the elite of San Francisco: old money, new money, businessmen and tourists. The stairs are an intricate maze and it was quite difficult learning how to balance 15 glasses on a tray going up and down dodging food runners and servers.
"We store all the sodas in a storage closet next to the employee locker room. The glasses at the Buck bar will have to be run downstairs periodically throughout the night so they do not pile up. Make sure that you never put your fingers in the glasses to carry them because every manager will give you shit."
I gave every shift my all and broke a few glasses the first few weeks, but things got easier as I learned the routine. There were good and bad people to work with as in any job. I learned to cope with the ins and outs of the job, building, and industry. It was quite hard work, much harder than any manual labor job I've ever had including metal fabrication.
"The wine and liquor cellar are located on the third floor, here are the keys. Make sure you check in with the bartenders so that all the popular spirits and wines are stocked. You don't want to wait til we get slammed. Typically you want to make runs and have several things listed so you aren't running up and down the stairs for only a bottle or two."
After each shift I would grab a drink at the Irish bar next door before going home to crawl into bed with my girlfriend. "How was work?" she would always ask sheepishly from sleep. I would always say it was okay as she quietly drifted back into dreams. If I had known that just a few weeks after my birthday she would be leaving I would have held her a little bit longer and quit the job sooner. Time seems much more precious after it has already passed.
"You want to make sure to stay on T_____'s good side. Make sure that you never put the Mules in the dish washer because he'll get on your case. Has anyone taught you had to make the syrups yet? No? Let's go do that and I'll also show you where we keep the kegs."
As the weeks passed on and I kept working, I knew in my heart that this industry was just not for me. I was way overworked, never saw my friends, and held on only due to a sense of stubbornness of not wanting to be a quitter. For the most part, the customers weren't bad people. Most people coming into the restaurant were casually spending hundreds of dollars per meal just because they could. I was there to do a job and tried to fulfill my duty. In some instances, the mixture of money, alcohol and a deep sense of entitlement produced some truly horrible people.
A middle aged white lady from Sacramento "You went to UC Davis and graduate school and now you're just a bar back?"
An older white man with his young black date. "Take a look at my beautiful dark chocolate."
Group of tourists "Those girls back at the pier were a bunch of cunts."
Young girl with friends "I was so wasted I ended up having sex with him on the pool table."
And so on and so forth. I heard snippets of these conversations over and over. Sometimes making me cringe, sometimes making me feel horrible. Once again, it wasn't like most people were like this. They had a drink or two with their meals, chatted, paid and went about their way. Maybe I'm just becoming a prude with age, but sometimes it took all I had to keep the smile on my face. It made me feel worthless and sad, as I kept running to the cellar, stocking the bar, and washing glasses.
"How come you didn't come upstairs with the mop? You've got to do what I say. You know I'm the one who tips you out right?"
I started dreading going to work. No sense of duty could keep me there. I missed seeing my friends, I missed my weekends. My relationship fell apart and I didn't even have time to mourn. Last weekend was my last scheduled shift. I went in and they had double booked me and the other bar back. I told P____ that I was going to take off and that he could take my shift. I said goodbye to some of the other guys. C____ was just getting off his shift and asked me if I wanted to go out with some of his friends.
I didn't really know him to well, but definitely didn't want to go back to my now empty room.
We go to the Irish bar next door to some shots, me Jameson, C____ fernet.
"You want to go to the Mission to meet up with some of my girlfriends? You'll meet H____ she's hot. Don't tell my girlfriend I said that though, you'll meet her later also."
I drove us down to the Mission and went to Delirium. "Order us two beers" he says before going over to a man at the end of the bar. They shake hands and go to the bathroom together. He comes back in a few minutes and sits down to our beers. We drink them quickly and cross the street to Giordano's where C_____ knows all the bartenders and manager.
e orders us some beers and introduces me to everyone. He is talkative and animated, he is open and engages with strangers.
"Hey you like white girl?"
"Well, I mean my ex girlfriend was white."
"No, I mean this" he says palming a baggie to me.
"Nah, not tonight I'm cool."
"Ok, more for me" he says heading to the bathroom.
We finish our beers and head out to Oysters and Rocks a few blocks down to meet his friend H____ and girlfriend N_____. They aren't there yet so we order some more beers. C____ goes to the bathroom. When the girls arrive he introduces me to everyone and furtively says, "I told you H_____ was hot right?" C_____ starts to drink hard and becomes louder and more boisterous. He goes out to answer a phone call at some point and the bartender tells me that he is cut off.
"What are you doing tonight?" H_____ asks.
"I've got no plans."
"Well we are going to a birthday party later if you want to come."
I give an ambivalent answer.
My phone buzzes. It's a text from my S____.
"You want to meet up?"
I tell C____ and the girls I've got to go and that it was great to meet them.
I drive across town, thinking about everything that's happened. I drive across town hoping that things could go back to normal. That my life was as it was like a few months ago. They say "never say never" but this past weekend was my last weekend working at a bar and it is something I will never do again.
It's taught me how to be on the other side but in a entirely different way than I thought. There was no glamour, there was no excitement. Any plans to ever open a bar have been dashed. It's reinforced my want to succeed in the studio, to shake off doubts and fear. I think about C____ and see myself from years ago. Alcohol and self-medication a crutch, anger self- pity my emotional outlets. I think about time and change and what type of man I want to be. I think about how much time I've wasted and how much work I have yet to do. I know that life is long and short at the same time and that it's never too late to make a change for the better, even if you've got to give up part of your past.
