I understand that there are a great many things that happen when you work in the food-service sector that may or may not be desirable, depending on your ability or desire to handle bullshit and drudgery. Grease in/on/around/behind your skin/clothes/ears/eyes, breathing things that probably shouldn’t be breathed, serving people things that probably shouldn’t be served (I’m looking at you Mrs. 300 pound scooter-driving 1,200 calorie white chocolate permeated coffee drink drinker)…
Wait one, some of these people deserve to be served drinks that, while not entirely lethal – at least in the short run – will put a serious dent in their pocket book and blood pressure, and I am having a harder and harder time being nice or polite to them.
Indeed, fake smiles hurt sometimes. Not hurt in the “I threw acid on my own face and then blamed one of the 14 black people in Vancouver for it” kind of hurt. (too soon?) It’s more the self-abasing kind of hurt that reminds you, at least on a sub-concious level, that you are selling your soul to feed your family. I am sure that many, many of you know what I mean. For those of you who don’t, let me explain:
I do not care, in the slightest, that your dog gets her little cup of whipped cream and eats it, getting whipped cream all over your shitty car and making oh-so-much of a racket. I don’t care how cute it is, and I don’t really care that you are wearing a shirt with a picture of your dog wearing a shirt with a picture of itself on it. I want to tell you to comb your hair and get out of my line, but I put on a smile and ask what kind of dog you have (Even though I know it is tiny, shakes and probably hates your very existence for feeding it whipped, vanilla-flavored heavy cream.)
When I say hello to you, say hello back. Every time you come up to my line with your pornstache and respond to my not-entirely faked “How are you doing today” by staring at me and snapping off your coffee order like you are talking to a misbehaving robot, I have to fight back the desire to reach across the counter and slap the crap out of your kid for even possibly learning such foul behavior from you. But I put on a smile and complete your order with visions of your kid in jail for something stupid he did while in some frat at UW floating in my head.
HANG UP YOUR GOD DAMN CELL PHONE. This one requires no more description. You don’t talk to me, I don’t talk to you. I have gotten in trouble for this one many many times, and I don’t care. No smile for you.
Most people who know me know that I don’t really care about politics. That being said, I definitely have my opinions and biases. Thing is, I keep them to myself, like a civilized human being. If you come to my counter and start railing me with your political views (I don’t care about gun laws, the Tea Party, Glen Beck, white supremacy, Mexicans, what “really” happened on 9/11, your moms view of our president, your views on the military/economy/globilization/banks, etc.), hooting and hollering and deriding people who think like me without even a thought as to the fact that I may be one of them, I will respond with a polite smile and begin to use words that you don’t understand to point out what an asshole you are. This will have a twofold effect; one, it will make me feel better for the fact that I still have my job because I didn’t have to slap your fat ass right out of your giant, hideous, mustard-stained confederate-flag shirt, and two it will make you walk away feeling smug and happy, but a little confused. It is my heartfelt desire that this confusion will eat at you until you snap someday and go totally comatose.
I work in a restaurant (Kind of); it has a counter where you order and a line forms there. If you move at a pace that makes the migration of a glacier in Greenland seem like watching a top-fuel dragster, and speak at a clip that would do Forrest Gump so proud he poops his knickers, or plan to pay with pennies that are spread through your purse like ticker-tape in times square, maybe at least know what you are going to order, or have your money in your hands, or take some Meth before you get in that line… Do SOMETHING to make it so that I don’t have to spend three hundred years staring at your wrinkled, waaaaaay-too-often-tanned skin while smiling like a plastic surgery victim. It hurts my cheeks, it hurts my performance statistics, and it makes everyone behind you hate me because I am the slow one in the equation because dumbass customers like you are “Always Right,” which makes me want to hurt you.
These scenarios are played out so many times a day that I lose track of them, even though I try to remember some of them because they make great fodder for my workouts. (Listening to fast, loud music while visualizing the demise of all of the people who you have to suffer treating you like garbage really gets the heart-rate going.) Putting on the fake smile is like armor for me, it shields me from things like depression, termination and litigation.
So you see, fake smiles hurt when they are applied day after day after day after day. Thank god for weekends, because I think there would not be such thing as job security in the service industry if we were forced to pretend that we give a shit about anything you have to say every single day of our lives.
That being said, I am really, really good at it. I would call myself a professional. Some of the customers that I hate the absolute most always tell my boss how nice I am and how much they love having me in the store.
Fake Smile 1, Customer 0.
Hahahah. Love this.