• Aunt B’s bear with adorable bear butt tail makes me want to get crafty. I’m hardly ever crafty.
• I took two enormous naps on my new pillow-top mattress. I haven’t slept this good since I was a baby. Perhaps not even then, what with the way my mother talks. ("I swear, you cried for about 51 weeks straight. Nonstop.")
• I did not clean out my car like I’d planned. (See above.)
• The sister and her boyfriend came over on Friday night. I like it when they do that.
• Despite being really, really nervous I went to "church" this morning. I don’t know why I think it is funny to call it church, but I do. It’s on Sunday morning, that is the only similarity. I’m glad I went. Thanks be to Jon for the information.
• Cooper fucked some shit up.
• Dreamed that I was the captain of a deep sea vessel that had only 8 hours of oxygen left. That was, to say the least, a fitful night.

Saturday night was the same as Friday night, except I had a little bit more confidence. But not much. I got Sunday off, thankfully, because beginning on Monday and going through that Friday I was on the schedule to train. I was exhausted and sore after my double dose of food running that weekend. I’d spent hour after hour balancing heavy things, all the while maintaining a smile. The most I’d carried at my other job were stacks of movies and video games.

The training class was scheduled in the evenings, after my classes. There were five people in my training group, an elementary school teacher, a 40-something former alcoholic, and three college students, one of which was Lia. I got to know her better as we continued to be introduced to everything at the same time. She was a member of a sorority at TSU. She kept long acrylic nails with tiny jewels embedded into them, and they never seemed to hinder her. It was impressive. Her makeup was always flawless. She was older than me by three or four years, and I think she found my naiveté amusing. We stuck together.

Our trainer was an immaculately dressed and coiffed man named Gregory. He was one of the most effeminate men I had ever met in my life. He was also one of the best waiters I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing.

His training was nearly as good as his serving. For five days he quizzed me about drink ingredients, wine, liquor and beer lists, dessert options and "pivot points." But more than that he taught me how to take control of a table and orchestrate the meal without it seeming as though I was the one in charge. He taught me how to consolidate trips to the kitchen or beverage station and how to subtly upsell items without seeming pushy. I didn’t take to all these techniques like a duck takes to water, but he did arm me with a shit ton of knowledge.

Towards the end of the training week I was allowed to shadow Gregory as he waited on the tables in his section. He introduced me as his trainee and let me fill up coffee mugs and water glasses. He also allowed me to fetch bread. By the end of the week I had my own two table section, a veteran server watching over me like a hawk. She took home all the tips I earned that night. They were her tables, after all. She said she usually gave her trainees a cut of the earnings, but that she was trying to make rent. I knew from being nosy that she took home more than $100 that night. Just that was satisfaction enough.

I had the weekend off after my intense training week. It would be the last weekend I’d have free for a long time to come.

[This is another installment in a retrospective series I’m writing
about working in the restaurant industry.  I will attempt to tell the
tale of my ten year stint "in the trenches" as one of my bosses used to
say. (Constantly.) Names and other minor details have been changed to
protect the not-so-innocent. But the rest is totally true. Or, at least
that’s how I remember it. To read just the installments in this series,
click on The Restaurant Chronicles in the category cloud on the right-hand column.]