I return to you a month later. Much has happened in that time frame. Much more than I might have thought could. Of course, less than what I may have wanted or what you might have expected has occurred. But what isn't relative, these days? So it goes, I suppose.
I am still in Texas. I may not be, come March. Or I might still be. That will depend on my bravery as well as my ambition. Perhaps it will also depend on my own foolhardy tendency toward choosing unusual paths (actually, that is probably the strongest factor in my possible decision to uproot once again). I chose St. John's with the idea of doing something unusual, and it is likely that relocating once again will spring from my predilection toward the "path less traveled by". I have yet to determine why it is that I do this.
Restaurant work is what I thought it was, to paraphrase a coach in the NFL that none of you will know about. That is, I still romanticize the industry, but I know it is not for me, which is to say that practical experience has born out what my theoretical knowledge told me. Still, I romanticize restaurant work, and I think I have finally figured out why. To put it simply, the people who work in restaurants are people who I identify with. They are, for the most part, intelligent and ambitious, but without a strong work ethic. They are in limbo. They have a variety of experiences and fields of knowledge (very interesting ones at that, I've found that lots of political and business degree majors end up in restaurants), but they are, to a (wo)man, people who put on the brakes, so to speak. Some haven't finished their degrees, others have. By and large though, they are in the air. They studied things in college that interested them, but those things failed to capture their interest to the point that they kept up with the field as a career. They are human beings. They are in transition. They have plans, hopes, dreams. Some will fail. Some will reach too high, and like Icarus, will fall to the firmament. Some will see the lie and move on. Some will carry out the lie and move on to management. Some still will continue on and be servers for life. It is the transitional element that draws my thematic eye. These are people, have no doubt. They are real. They have feelings, hopes, dreams, faults. I love them. I hate them for being so short-minded and simple. I love that they have so little regard for their practical futures. They capture so many things about human beings that I enjoy and love, as well as hate and wish to change.
The service industry depends on the noble lie, and the general capacity of human beings to accept that lie instead of examining the information and arriving at a correct assumption. Hotels, restaurants, tourism, etc. all depend on the generosity and trust of those persons who have money but not the expertise or experience to acquire the things supplied without the additional research/resources of larger corporate entities. For the most part, people are right to depend on such institutions to provide these services. The service industry purchases the services at a bulk rate and provides those services to the individual, making a profit between the price offered to individuals and groups.
The transitional element is the crucial element to me. I think that some day I will write something focusing on that aspect of the service industry; the difference of the experience of those who work in the industry and those who purchase the services it provides. It's a sexy subject to me. What's not to like about a small group of misfits who provide a constant service to an everchanging group of human beings while still being individuals with their own flaws? None of us want to be where we are, but we know that what we do is the best way to earn the money we need to keep our lives sustainable. It is a balance between need and independence, between cold sociopathy and meak cronyism. Hotels manage to offer a similar environment, from the perspective of a front desk employee. You check in the guests and check them out, but you have no other influence other than that. You are subject to the whims of fate. Did housekeeping perform well with respect to their room? Was the meal they had out on the town any good? Were they harrassed by midshipmen? Were they picky, or easily-pleased? Did their dog die while they stayed at your hotel, or did the babysitter call them to tell them how well behaved their children were? Their happiness is totally beyond your control, yet you are the ultimate arbiter of their experience, and the management is keenly aware of this. So, in the end we have a small group of unmotivated and listless individuals who have paused on their own lifepath to meet the impossible needs of others for the small period of time that they work for the company, hoping for success and rewards, but often met with scorn and lack of consideration. They represent faceless and wealthy corporations rather than that ephemeral hope for greater things. They are the object of scorn for frustrated people rather than the common people with thwarted ambitions that they truly are.
Remember them, these people. They wanted to be more than they are. They stopped on the path of life to gather themselves. True, they do not care one whit for your problems, but neither do you care about their own. They are human and they are where they are because they reached beyond their capacity rather than settling for what they could easily take, only to find themselves settling for less than that.
I am still in Texas. I may not be, come March. Or I might still be. That will depend on my bravery as well as my ambition. Perhaps it will also depend on my own foolhardy tendency toward choosing unusual paths (actually, that is probably the strongest factor in my possible decision to uproot once again). I chose St. John's with the idea of doing something unusual, and it is likely that relocating once again will spring from my predilection toward the "path less traveled by". I have yet to determine why it is that I do this.
Restaurant work is what I thought it was, to paraphrase a coach in the NFL that none of you will know about. That is, I still romanticize the industry, but I know it is not for me, which is to say that practical experience has born out what my theoretical knowledge told me. Still, I romanticize restaurant work, and I think I have finally figured out why. To put it simply, the people who work in restaurants are people who I identify with. They are, for the most part, intelligent and ambitious, but without a strong work ethic. They are in limbo. They have a variety of experiences and fields of knowledge (very interesting ones at that, I've found that lots of political and business degree majors end up in restaurants), but they are, to a (wo)man, people who put on the brakes, so to speak. Some haven't finished their degrees, others have. By and large though, they are in the air. They studied things in college that interested them, but those things failed to capture their interest to the point that they kept up with the field as a career. They are human beings. They are in transition. They have plans, hopes, dreams. Some will fail. Some will reach too high, and like Icarus, will fall to the firmament. Some will see the lie and move on. Some will carry out the lie and move on to management. Some still will continue on and be servers for life. It is the transitional element that draws my thematic eye. These are people, have no doubt. They are real. They have feelings, hopes, dreams, faults. I love them. I hate them for being so short-minded and simple. I love that they have so little regard for their practical futures. They capture so many things about human beings that I enjoy and love, as well as hate and wish to change.
The service industry depends on the noble lie, and the general capacity of human beings to accept that lie instead of examining the information and arriving at a correct assumption. Hotels, restaurants, tourism, etc. all depend on the generosity and trust of those persons who have money but not the expertise or experience to acquire the things supplied without the additional research/resources of larger corporate entities. For the most part, people are right to depend on such institutions to provide these services. The service industry purchases the services at a bulk rate and provides those services to the individual, making a profit between the price offered to individuals and groups.
The transitional element is the crucial element to me. I think that some day I will write something focusing on that aspect of the service industry; the difference of the experience of those who work in the industry and those who purchase the services it provides. It's a sexy subject to me. What's not to like about a small group of misfits who provide a constant service to an everchanging group of human beings while still being individuals with their own flaws? None of us want to be where we are, but we know that what we do is the best way to earn the money we need to keep our lives sustainable. It is a balance between need and independence, between cold sociopathy and meak cronyism. Hotels manage to offer a similar environment, from the perspective of a front desk employee. You check in the guests and check them out, but you have no other influence other than that. You are subject to the whims of fate. Did housekeeping perform well with respect to their room? Was the meal they had out on the town any good? Were they harrassed by midshipmen? Were they picky, or easily-pleased? Did their dog die while they stayed at your hotel, or did the babysitter call them to tell them how well behaved their children were? Their happiness is totally beyond your control, yet you are the ultimate arbiter of their experience, and the management is keenly aware of this. So, in the end we have a small group of unmotivated and listless individuals who have paused on their own lifepath to meet the impossible needs of others for the small period of time that they work for the company, hoping for success and rewards, but often met with scorn and lack of consideration. They represent faceless and wealthy corporations rather than that ephemeral hope for greater things. They are the object of scorn for frustrated people rather than the common people with thwarted ambitions that they truly are.
Remember them, these people. They wanted to be more than they are. They stopped on the path of life to gather themselves. True, they do not care one whit for your problems, but neither do you care about their own. They are human and they are where they are because they reached beyond their capacity rather than settling for what they could easily take, only to find themselves settling for less than that.
No comments:
Post a Comment