Every Cloud Has a Jose Cuervo Silver Lining

Silver lining.

Silver lining.

Can I be honest? (“Please, bitch, when aren’t you honest?” says everyone who has read this blog more than once.) Almost every day, I get the requisite email that says something akin to the following:

If you don’t like your job, then why don’t you quit bitching and do something else? p.s. I love your hair.

Yes, I bitch about waiting tables and it has basically become one of my jobs to continue to do so. Being the Bitchy Waiter is a job within itself. I have been waiting tables since the early 90’s and we all know that if anyone really hated something that much, they certainly would not keep doing it for over twenty years. The truth is, I don’t hate my job. There, I said it. I may deny it tomorrow but at this very second, it is the truth. Though it may seem as if this blog is fraught with negativity and full of bitterness, the truth is that we all have to find some kind of joy in whatever it is we are doing because this is the only life we get, right? This is very clear to me this week after hearing of my husband’s friend who died yesterday. Last week he was diagnosed with a brain tumor and six days later, he died. He was 36.

Boom. Done. Game over.

Why does it take something so drastic to remind us how lucky we are to be alive? No matter how bad things may seem, there is always (a Jose Cuervo) silver lining. I don’t want to go to work but at least I have a job. Silver lining! Yesterday the 7 train smelled like a fucking fish taco that had been in the sun for five hours, but at least it didn’t smell like one that had been in the sun for six hours. Silver lining! It really sucked last week when a customer knocked my tray and made me spill half a martini onto my uniform, but on the bright side, I was able to take my shirt into the restroom, wring it out into a rocks glass and have a mid-shift cocktail. Silver lining!

Sometimes on my way to work, I play a game with my iPod. I think of something and then I put my music on shuffle and I try to figure out how each song that plays can relate to what I have decided to focus on. Today, my thoughts were about living my life to the fullest and trying to appreciate each and every moment I am given. I hit shuffle and the first song that came on was one called “Stand Up” by Jessie J. The opening lyrics are:

If you surround yourself with negative people
You’ll never feel settled in or become equal, no
They’ll suppress you of your spirit and rinse you dry of smiles
So reach deep and release your inner child. Yeah, Yeah!

‘Cause you’re as old as you feel you are
And if you don’t reach for the moon you can’t fall on the stars
So I live my life like every day is the last, last, last.

Okay, it’s not going to get any better than that, so I listened to the song four times in a row and then turned off my iPod before some depressing Morrissey song came on.

I don’t hate my job. There are times it can be frustrating and maddening and annoying but there are also times it can be quite rewarding. If I can tell that someone had a great night in my section and I know that part of it was because of me, I can’t help but find some tiny sense of pride in that. Nowadays when a customer grates on my nerves like fingernails on a chalkboard, all I do is reach into my apron and take a few notes about them so I can turn them into a blog post. Silver lining!

This posting is short and sweet, much like Herve Villechaize dipped in powdered sugar. It’s Thanksgiving week and it should be easy for all of us to find something to be grateful for. If you can’t find anything, you’re not looking hard enough. For me to be reminded of how lucky I am to be alive, it took the untimely death of someone I have never met. Maybe for you, all it will take is a blog post from the Bitchy Waiter.

Have a good day.

Discussion

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