Eight years ago, I was working as a waitress in a fine dining restaurant in the Cotswolds. The expertly crafted atmosphere had dim mood lighting, ambient music and a farm-to-table menu. The other waiters could charm guests into purchasing expensive bottles, but I just gaped gormlessly when I struggled to recall the wine pairings.
My brown leather brogues gave me blisters as I’d hobble to the kitchen to admit I’d forgotten an order in the middle of a busy dinner service. The chefs would shout and shake the ticket in my face. A year into my job, while serving an influencer, I attempted to remove her plate of oysters, but my sweaty palms slipped as I lifted the dish and I accidentally sloshed the water into her lap.
She yelped and jumped up. Guests turned and stared as I stood frozen, my face burning. I blurted out an apology and ran off, leaving another waiter to placate her while I sobbed in the kitchen.
I knew then that it was time to give up. When I went to university two years later, I hated restaurant work so much that I lived frugally on my student loan to avoid having to do the same again. On first dates, I insisted on drinks at the pub just so I wouldn’t have to sit in another formal restaurant.
Waitressing had made me feel hopeless and stupid, and I became apathetic towards all work. If every job would be as bad as that one, the prospect of doing any work after university filled me with dread. Years later, when I overheard my boyfriend watching The Bear, it awoke some kind of terrified, sleeper-agent response.
He was watching the first series’ acclaimed, mostly one-shot episode, Review, in which the kitchen descends into chaos over the course of 18 relentless minutes. The sound of kitchen doors slamming, frustrated screams and the constant whirring of a ticket machine all took me straight back to my worst days as a waitress. I refused to watch the show at first, expecting to feel the same panic I’d experienced at my old restaurant.
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