Take Care

I shouldn’t have eaten the chocolate torte. At least not the whole thing. But once I bit into it the carmel ran down my hands and there was nothing to be done but pop the whole piece into my mouth and keep going. I should pack a power bar or nuts or something, but I never do, so this is second dinner, or fourth meal, or whatever it’s called when eating something at 2am. It’s probably not the best idea for my figure, but I imagine the endless cocktail shaking I’m doing will help a bit to counter balance it and the rest, well, is a sacrifice so I can stay up a little longer. I’m endlessly hungry at work. Shifts run from just before a normal person’s dinner time to the latest hours of the night so even if I’m well behaved and have something at 5, I’m still going to be ready to chew someone’s arm come the end of my shift.

Although I’m legally required or at least allowed to take a break, there is rarely a chance to do so and it’s more the exception than the rule. In LA 6 hour shifts were standard, but here in NYC an 8 hour shift is not uncommon and I’ve gone 12 hours more nights than I would prefer to remember. Not that I remember them really, 12 hour shifts just turn to blurry memories, in the middle of them I lose sense of reality, I stand there wondering if I’ve ever done anything else, if anything exists outside of this moment. Bartending is all about the present, possibly the anticipation of the very immediate future, and little else. Was I rude to you 5 minutes ago? That was the old me, this is the new me, and the new me likes you again, what can I get you? Your last drink was whatever, but that was the last drink, you can be a new person with the next drink, it can be the beginning of a whole new night now. Who do you want to be, where do you want this night to take you?

The job is physically taxing- my body takes a beating every night. Every bar tender has his or her list of complaints, the gripes, and we share a lot of them. Repetative stress is a beast. Give a bartender a back rub and they might just propose to you. Work on the knots on their forearms and you’ll have a friend for life. I haven’t been posting in part due to my nutto life, and in part because I’ve been feeling a bit beaten up. At the moment, my hamstrings are wound like springs, my thighs are stupid tight and my back is all out of whack from pitching 20 degrees over the bar all night due to a poorly designed well. My elbows and wrists write me hate mail in the form of sharp pains every time I crack a tin and my shoulders are considering cessation if I continue to shake my drinks like the boys. Or to be fair to the boys, trying to shake like the boys. I’ve developed solutions to these problems, re-trained my arms and my shake. I am possibly most thankful for the decision not to make drinks that require muddling whenever someone asks if there is anything special I’m working on. This used to be my go to as I love market fresh produce and putting it in anything I drink. Alas, Dear Cucumbers, you are delicious and you are a pain in the ass. I have to quit you.

3 months ago I went for a massage that was so intense the woman ended up damaging my shoulder. I got to work that night and couldn’t lift my right arm more than a foot from my body because the spasm in my shoulder was that intense. It sucked. It also hurt like holy hell. We were busy, music was loud, people were drinking more than usual and I was behind in my tickets because my arm wasn’t working. I went over to my manager, “Yo, just so you know, I’m fine, but I can’t lift my arm more than a foot from my body.” “What did you do?” he asked, “I got an effing massage and she turned off my arm.” I said, knowing what was going to come next, “Well suck it up and learn to use your other arm Marquis.” Yep. There is that man I know and love. I turned and went to return a bottle off the back shelf with my left arm, just as he turned away I lost control of the bottle and dropped it onto the glass shelf, sending at least 12 champagne flutes to their shattered doom. He turned and looked at me, both of us in shock. In fact everyone at the noisy bar stopped a moment. I know that this is only normal so I tend to just keep moving when I make a scene, pretend like nothing happened. All I could think to do was I wave my left hand, “Still need some practice I guess,” I said with a smile. “How many did you break?” he asked, I looked around, “12 at most”, he shrugged and went downstairs to order more glasses. When I was younger and worked in smaller places an accident like that would have had me terrified of being fired. Here, in this madness, it’s just the cost of doing business. Besides, and the man had just told me to use my other hand, not my fault.

Because of that injury I retrained myself how to handle bottles. I hold them from the heaviest point now, not the neck, but the bottom where it is less stress to my shoulder. I pop bottles up in the air and catch them rather than pick them up, I muddle much less, I change my shake all night to keep different muscles engaged. I don’t crack my tins so aggressively, I pour with both arms, I ask customers to push things towards me rather than reach across to get them. I make jokes that the bar was designed by an 8 armed 6 foot tall man when it was really built by someone with no idea about ergonomics or how bars should be built. I want that person to work by my side for a week and understand the repercussions that half an inch on graph paper can have on my neck muscles. I want that person to wake up with my shoulders and my hamstrings.

At my last bar in LA one of my servers would stand outside and stretch before every shift, not like a casual couple seconds, but a full 30 minutes- hitting every muscle group. He would walk into work bouncing like a boxer. He claimed it helped him. He also came in talking about how Stevie Wonder made him cry on his vespa ride over because life is so beautiful. I used to think the two weren’t related but now I’m thinking this stretching thing might be worth my time. When I was in training for my other life as a performer it wasn’t an issue because I was stretching every day into pretzel like shapes, but now I’ve fallen out of the habit because of this shoulder mess.

I could do more to take care of myself. Slow down, stop running everywhere, go to yoga, eat more greens. It always baffles me that in an industry devoted to feeding people there is no concern for the feeding of the staff. In my experience, the nicer the place I work, the worse or non existent the food for the staff is- to the extent that some places wont event make dishes for us, the staff selling the food, to try. My current place gives us breaks to go eat- in theory- so there is no staff meal- which is almost preferable as there are rarely vegetarian friendly chefs. Once in LA when I was opening a new bar/restaurant I went and asked if they had made any vegetarian options for staff meal. The kitchen guys were notorious for putting bacon in everything, including desert. I often walked in to see vats of pig hearts sitting in fat. The large sweaty red faced chef looked up at me while still chopping and said, “We weren’t supposed to hire any vegetarians.” I packed my own food from then on.
At my current place we take care of each other, my barback grabs me sandwiches sometimes, the runner palms me sweets. We make sure to take breaks and cover one another, bring food back and such. Even with that there are nights I eat garnishes to keep my energy up, but cocktail olives have really lost their allure. I often go home and cook at ungodly hours. Last night I could barely keep my eyes open but by the grace of God I made pasta. I have the chopping of vegetables built into muscle memory. The lure of late night China Town lo mein is strong, but knowing that there might be any number of animals in the sauces they use at 2am keeps me motivated towards home. That and my exhaustion.

The thoughts on my mind now are finding new ways to tend bar which don’t wreck my body and don’t compromise my quality. Different shakes, different ways of standing, stretches to do and muscles to strengthen. I need to find solutions to these problems and find a way to make work energizing rather than exhausting. I think a lot of times I’m doing better than most but there are still solutions to make my job work as hard for me as I work for it. There is no reason work should be depleting, even with how demanding it is. Until then I stretch a little, don’t let myself stress and next shift I’ll remember to pack a snack.