It’s been one year since I’ve been working at a pub in London. If someone a year ago told me I would still be working here right now, I wouldn’t have believed them. This is not where I imagined being a year later. But that’s life, it hardly goes as planned. Or it’s better to say life has a way of doing the planning for you.
The job:
First, I’ve never come across so many weird people in my life. Most of these weirdos are the ones I work with. I wish I could describe them in a better way, but that wouldn’t be an accurate description. For us who consider ourselves pretty normal with fully functioning brains and common sense, it can be a strange situation when we encounter people who don’t possess such.
One aspect I enjoy about the job is interacting with the regulars. I know them all by the beer they drink.
There’s the Foster’s guy, Jason. He can stay at the pub all night. You know he’s drunk when he goes up to other customers and always starts the conversation with, “Where are you from?”
The Stella guy, Tony. He’s is a sweet old man with a sharp tongue at times. I have a good laugh when he’s in. If he gets too drunk he randomly shouts at other customers.
The other Foster’s guy, Max. He comes in close to when the pub is about to shut with his crossword and asks me to figure out some clues.
The sometimes Foster’s sometimes red wine guy, Sean. After spending 6 weeks in France he switched from beer for red wine. Of course I told him how much I love wine and think I’m becoming a wino. Sean shut my worries down after he revealed how many bottles he can drink a night.
The Fosters and lime guy, Barry. He slips me £20, sometimes when I haven’t even served him. He hates my GM and thinks the staff doesn’t get paid enough for the work we do. He’s right. I think that’s why he tips big because he feels sorry for us. One night he gave me £60.
These guys make the job able to bear. However most of the time it’s physically and mentally draining. The physical aspect of being on your feet for sometimes 10 hours a day is exhausting. The mental has to do with working along side the strange folks I’ve mentioned. When I first started I had a hard time adjusting to these people.
Also, I’m not meant to be serving people. Being friendly and personable doesn’t come natural. I’ve had to swallow my pride and bite my tongue a lot. My customer service sucks. I fake it 95% of the time. I’ve lost count of the number of times a customer has told me to smile. Some of them even blatantly tell me I don’t look like I want to be here, that’s the 5% where I cannot front anymore.
Some days I get in my head about still being here and not where I want or thought I would be by now. It’s difficult not to working at this place. 2015 has been a very hard year. I’m so grateful to have my close friend Courtney in London. She’s the one I went crying to after getting fired from my internship. The friend’s house I’ll sleep over every Friday to make 10am Saturday morning because she lives closer to my job then I do. The friend I’ll try a new recipe to cook for, and eat it even if the meal flops (and order a pizza after). The friend who gives me pep talks and believes me in when I’m doubting myself. I might have become depressed if she wasn’t here.
A few days ago my friend Scott said he respected and admired me. He told me he likes that I’m living my dreams. His words made my night. I wanted to dispute that I’m not living them yet because I’m not where I want to be in my career. But when you think about it, the journey to get there is a part of living of your dreams. The “chase” he said, is the truly fun part.
One customer recently told me I’m better than this job. I told him don’t sleep on me.
-C