Rejection and Schizophrenia Among Wait Staff

                  

            Clinical trials have proven that schizophrenia in wait staff occurs in approximately 9 out of 10 servers over the age of 24 and a half years old. This disorder manifests itself in the form of exploding at guests in a saucy black woman voice, making fun of guests by repeating them in a small munchkin voice, and winking saucily at small children after asking if they’d like another strawberry lemonade. This disorder has been proven, in labs across the country, to be born from rejection.

             Example 1: Aw Hell No

“Tonight’s special” you announce to your table of five, “ is our Bullhorn Grabbin Ranch Saucy Sauce Lemon Lickin salmon, lightly scented with po pourri, tempered with hints of thyme, pounded with ranch dust and then, for 45 minutes, sautéed in the spicy rare blood of our Lord and topped with a single sesame seed.” You pause and then continue in the voice of a commercial casually mentioning side effects, “Served with a Vanilla Ranch milk shake and a moon pie.” 

            You all sit in silence for a moment (you breathless and proud, the guests simply stunned), before telling them you’ll “let that sink in for a second” before you return for their “final decision”.

            You walk back to the kitchen, maybe giving out high fives or even thumbs ups to the rest of the wait staff as the restaurant echoes with “lemon lickin…” and “single sesame seed…” Regardless of your gender, hair has suddenly sprouted on your chest.   

After five minutes, you return to the table, smiling smugly. You even take the time to wink at each member of the table individually, which takes another full minute.   

            “Have you all had a chance to think about what I said—earlier?” you ask, raising an eyebrow.

             “Um, can I just have the hamburger?” asks one woman.

            A roaring starts in your ears and you feel the blood rushing into your face.

            “Naw bitch you can’t have no fucking HAMBURGER. If you could have had a hamburger, I would have TOLD you you could have a hamburger. What do you think this shit is, fucking CANADA? Fucking PAKISTAN?”

            “Seriously,” murmurs the rest of the wait staff, standing behind you with their arms crossed.       

            Her husband raises a hand as if to defend her, “I’m sorry, I really don’t see what Canada and Pakistan have in common…? Also, weren’t you just white a minute ago…?”

Example 2: Deaf People

            You are chatting with the hostess by the door, and by chatting, of course I mean describing the nightmare of waiting on people from Canada or even Pakistan. Out of the corner of your eye, you see two guests get up from their bar stools, put on coats and head towards you.

            You swirl at attention, immediately ending your conversation. You have never seen these people in your life, and probably never will again.

            “You all have a wonderful evening!” you say, smiling widely. Of course there is something strange about saying this to people you will probably never see again. Why not, ‘Have a wonderful rest of your life!’ or ‘Vote McAuliffe this year!’

             The guests do not reply, and you realize this may be because they were too far away or maybe, like you, also wondering about the phrase about the wonderful evening. They’ve just reached the host stand, they’re now directly in front of you.

            So you try again, “Yeah, like I said earlier, have a good one!....Thanks for coming guys, it’s been a pleasure!..... An absolute pleasure…all our pleasure, to have you come here…”

             Silence.

You turn to the host, lips parted in shock. “Did they just…? I’m pretty sure they just…”

            The hostess squeezes your hand, “Don’t worry about it. It happens to me all the time.”

            You wrench away from her, “BYE GUYS!” you scream. “I hope you have fun!” You run around the host stand and trot after them. “Have a great night! Enjoy the rest of your summer, go swimming or something, it’s gonna be GREAT, have fun doing that, I really hope you have the funest time of any guest I’ve ever waited on because it’s been a fucking pleasure, what’d you eat a fucking hamburger—” The munchkin voice is on full force—“oh can I just have a hamburger and maybe a chocolate milk, can you make the fries crispy I like crispy fries, only the crispiest for me, I bet you like crispy fries—”

             The hostess, encouraged by your bravado, has begun pelting toothpicks at the two deaf people, and screaming out “BYE!” over and over again, also in a munchkin voice.        

           You stop and cross your arms as the guests flee.