Quitting (Again)

Dear Stella,

I am that person in a restaurant. I study the menu for however much time I am given. Best to not give me too much time, for it will only complicate matters. Spinach salad with fresh strawberries. Mmmm. I picture an abundance of green. I feel the berry’s sweet body split in my mouth. But what about the grilled cheese? That browned, crispy crust? Or the butternut squash soup, a veritable winter treasure?

There’s no telling what I’ll choose until I choose. I fully commit myself, at one point or another, to almost everything on the menu. Only the presence of the server and the pressure of a deadline will force a decision, not because I am unhappy with the choices, but because I so clearly see myself with all of them.

All this is to say, I drove to work on Monday fully committed to rescinding my resignation. This was, of course, after the meeting in which my managers apologized to me for the way they treated me, listened to my complaints and suggestions, and asked what they could do to change my mind about leaving.

When I got in the car, I was absolutely committed to the plan you and I had discussed. It was a good plan. No, a great plan. I say yes to coming back. I take the week and a half off they were willing to give me. I buy myself some time.

But I hadn’t even made it over the Bigelow Bridge when I knew; I just knew. All that self-torture of the weekend—my little pea brain running itself into mad circles, getting thicker and thicker into its brambled torment—just ended.

I am so, so done here.

Quitting (again!) after the managers ask me to stay is not the safe thing to do; it’s not the reasonable thing to do, and it very well might not be considered a sane thing to do. Who leaves a job in a recession with so much debt, and with no back-up plan?

I do.

If strength is endurance; if strength is sustaining marathon physical difficulty; if strength is resisting, denying, withholding; if strength is pressing against the self with all one’s might, then I am a sissy of ginormous proportions.

But if strength is a matter of doing the thing whose importance is felt but not easily seen; if strength is doing the crazy thing that makes sense to no one, perhaps not even to you, you just know it needs to be done and sometimes this thing can appear selfish and sometimes this thing can appear self-destructive, and sometimes this thing may cause your loved one stress, and only you know that it is better in the long run because what can be better for love, really, than a lover who takes care of herself and does the necessary thing to be the best she can be, the most alive she can be? And if strength is a matter of saying “Yes!” to the self when the self is clamoring to be heard above the “reasonable” negations, then I am a fucking she-woman right now.

love,
Stephanie

Resignation Letter, Take One

Dear Corporate Hotel Bar Drone:

Please consider this my formal two-week notice. I’m sorry that you disappointed me to the degree to which I can no longer stand the thought of enduring one more minute in your establishment, especially, but not limited to, the particular feel of entering the locker room at the beginning of a shift and opening the red locker, the sound of the metal, the smell of hairspray hovering in front of the mirror, the toilet that always seems to be out of order. I overlooked the fact that when I first used the locker (noting with a sense of the uncanny that the combination given to me was my mother’s birthday) that someone else’s clothes were still in it, slumped at the bottom of the locker as if the body in them just simply disappeared (and strange, I thought, that these clothes were white, like a nurse’s uniform rather than the distinct blue long sleeve number of the Hotel Bar’s “team” members). I overlooked this perhaps foreshadowing sign of an abrupt departure and simply hung my own clothes over them. I did not tell HR about the mysterious white clothes until almost a month in, when I ran into Jill in the locker room and together we picked each item of clothing out, underneath which we found one metal coat hanger, a pair of white orthopedic nursing shoes, an empty perfume bottle, and one tube of fire-engine-red lipstick. If there were a crime, surely one of these items would be a clue, but as it were, they were clues without a crime, and so their mystery hung about unrealized.

But it is not the locker room, reeking of high school gym class, nor the way I have to sit and wait far too long in front of the (new! but somehow the candy is still stale) candy machine when I call up to the front desk for the keys on those rare nights that I actually get to bartend, that is what finally did me in. I could put up with, and even, I should add, take a kind of sick pleasure in the eerie Nietzschean eternal return of the gym class, the smell and feel of the behind-the-scenes restaurant hallway, reminiscent of past fast food work experiences like at Wendy’s (despite the Hotel Bar’s aspirations for “fine dining”) as if I am playing out some therapy fantasy of returning to one’s roots, the site of orginary Work, to, no pun intended, work something out. I even grew to love the freaky people of Hotel Bar and their strange practices of “talking at” me: Kyle: the chatty dishwasher who starts to come at me from across the room for a hug, so I’ve got to slip inconspicuously behind something or sing-song my hello as I briskly walk by on my way to do something urgent and important like fill the ice bins or plate a dessert. Or Michael: the older room service attendant who weaves long stories about his years of bartending or lectures on how drinkers and drinking has changed over The Course of History. “Which Michael did you get today?” others would ask me. Thankfully, I did not get the pervy one, as I heard what Michael could be like with the guys and feel blessed that I never had to witness this facet of his multi-layered “eccentricity.”

No, it was not Michael’s impromptu lectures that broke the proverbial camel’s back, but it was perhaps the notes, yes, definitely the notes behind the bar that finally did me in, notes that assume I will eat all the candy corn and disregard the lights that need urgently to be turned off at the end of a shift (gosh, how would I ever think of that on my own?) and that I will let the dirty ashtrays pile up just for my sick, childish pleasure. And it was the schedule, the bane of my existence. Although I did not verbalize my continued dissatisfaction at the schedule, (to you, that is, poor Dawn and my saintly parents did not hear the end of it), I thought about it many times, and I felt I wore my displeasure clearly on my face when I passed you in the hallway. It is certainly not my fault that you didn’t properly interpret such muscular twitches and down-turned brows and pinched skin just above the bridge of the nose, clear signs, as anybody knows, of discontent. Or maybe you did indeed make note of my unhappiness and it was acceptable to you, perhaps it even gave you one of those everything-is-as-it-should-be feelings, for, as a person who seems often unhappy herself, a world of unhappy individuals might seem perfectly “in tune,” as it were, or at the very least, unconsciously satisfying.

That I refuse to participate in this particular version of reality might indeed, I realize, come as a shock to you. Although it was not formally part of the one-hundred page package requiring my signature upon being hired, it was in fact, I see now, part of the implicit agreement of signing on with Hotel Bar to participate in manufacturing a worldview in which we are all victims of a system much larger than us and that, in addition to producing and supplying edible and drinkable goods, we also produce and distribute anxiety and self-doubt. Please consider this letter a formal refusal to participate in this production line. I understand this might cause you some discomfort because, like a fly buzzing in one’s ear, my refusal signals the possible presence of another way of being and, if it is true that one does not need to produce and harbor endlessly perpetuated anxiety and ill-feeling toward oneself and others in the work place (and most likely carried over into one’s personal life, as these things tend to “stick”), then what, you might ask, has been the point of all your own personal suffering?

With much pleasure and also some mixed feelings (including some unexpected sadness at missing those I leave behind and also some shame that I took part in such nonsense to begin with), I leave you to ponder this as you sit down with the new schedule, in which you attempt to sculpt and control other people’s lives.

Thanks for the initial opportunity and subsequent disappointment.

Sincerely,
Stephanie

A Familiar Story

Dear Stella,

In the movie The Brothers Bloom, two brothers—a notorious con-man team—live out their lives following the stories, or scripts, written by the older brother Stephen. Bloom, the younger brother, yearns for an unwritten life and for something “real” he can never access as long as he plays the parts his brother has written for him.

Ironically, as a kid, these written parts helped Bloom be more of himself. Desperately shy, for example, he was only able to talk to girls when playing the role of someone who could talk easily to girls.

Lately, I find myself living out a familiar story. The fact that it is so familiar should be (and is) alarming to me. It is so familiar, in fact, that it is hard to tell it’s a story. This is the cause for alarm.

The story: I must endure this job. . . I have no choice . . . I’ll never find another job . . .

The story’s subtext: Suffering is noble . . . Making art is a luxury. . . Struggling is the only “real…”

I watched this story play out when my parents worked multiple jobs to make ends meet; when my Dad dreamt of being a painter but worked in sweatshops as a teenager instead, then later, when he worked himself ragged for a school that took all he gave (and more), then laid him off after thirty years of dedication.

Because my Dad couldn’t devote himself to his art, I always felt a kind of obligation to live my dreams. My parents made sacrifices so I wouldn’t have to—a common American narrative with a twist. If I don’t realize myself as an artist, then what did he sacrifice his artistic dreams for?

Yet here I am, a woman in her late thirties, unable to support myself and feeling trapped in a shitty service industry job.

Not trapped by the circumstances but trapped by the story. Because the story seems like fact.

At the end of the movie, some bad things happen (I don’t want to give it away.) The female protagonist says to Bloom, “My father used to say, there are no unwritten lives, just badly written ones. Let’s live as if this is the best story ever written. Are you ready for that?” The bad stuff really happened. The facts are the facts. But the characters have a choice as to what they’re going to make of things.

“Are you ready for that?” I ask Dawn. “Are you ready to live as if this is the best story ever written?”

“Yes,” she says emphatically. Then pauses. “So… does that story involve me writing this student recommendation?”

Hmm. And does that story involve me working two eleven hour shifts this weekend?

Story, fact; fact, story. What does the best story ever written look like? And how do we write it when facts seem to be everywhere?

love,
Stephanie

FYI

Dear Stella,

I am in awe of managers’ psychic abilities to see the need to do something as you’re doing it. It’s fascinating, really.

See my hand reach for the salt shaker. See my other hand reach around with a disinfectant-soaked rag to clean it. Here comes the hand, closer, closer, then—wait for it . . . . . . .

“Stephanie, we need you to clean all the salt shakers today.”

Amazing! How do they do it?

Just for fun, I like to make little bets with myself. “I’ll bet you the $1.50 you made in tips last Saturday that in 3 seconds Bill is going to point out something you’re doing wrong.” “It’s a deal,” my Ph.D. self says to my service industry whore self, always ready for a gamble. Here I go, walking past Bill now—“Hi Bill, how are you?” Big smile, taddaa! I’m at the ice machine now, thrusting metal scoop into ice, letting ice slide into portable bin. Scoop, slide, scoop, slide—wait for it . . .

“Stephanie, ah, FYI, the bin should be resting on the side of the ice machine like this.” He points to the side of the ice machine.

“Silly me,” I reply, “That sure does make it easier!” I practically yuck-yuck myself into the ice bin. Just for fun.

I uncork the Lapostelle Merlot, wipe it’s rim. I tip the bottle over the expertly polished (if I do say so myself) glass on the bar. Look how the rich red streams into the glass and then, oooh yeah, I lift and turn, catching the last bit of wine before it dribbles. I recork and turn and—wait for it . . .

There’s Bill! “Ah, FYI Stephanie, next time pour a little less,” he wiggles his pointer finger to indicate an invisible line on the wine glass just below my pour.

“Ah yes, of course Bill, how gluttonous! What a hog I am! How simply gauche!”

Little by little I find myself joining the kids I work with in their rebellious techniques—opening a bag of snack mix and shoveling into face behind the bar; spray gun wars; disappearing for “a certain period of time” and letting someone else deal with all the bullshit.

FYI, I think there’s an important lesson here, Bill: constant negative critique and nit-picky micro-managing does not breed good morale, loyalty, and hard work. Duh! You’re wearing me down, dude.

love,
Stephanie

Breaking News

This week I attended my Uncle George’s funeral. Uncle George was the one of the first photographers for Rhode Island’s WJAR news. I knew of his career as a news photographer. I also knew him as kind, funny, soft-spoken, interested, compassionate.

What I didn’t know before he died is how he got the job in the first place, how he created the position when there was none—by approaching the news station and telling them he could take pictures, develop them, and they could air them that same day; it was revolutionary at the time, far from the immediate accessibility of tweets and retweets. What I didn’t know before was how fearless he was.

Uncle George gave me my first camera and my first developing set. I still have the developing canisters and, knowing me, I probably still have the chemicals too, which I’m sure have gone all nuclear by now.

He inspired me to look at the world through a camera, to see things differently, to consider what might be framed, and how this act of selecting tells a story. I know now, too, that his entrepreneurial spirit is with me as well. That I’m not alone in wanting to make my own way in the world.

Thank you, Uncle George.

love,
Stephanie

Yes Ma’am

Dear Stella,

I just got off the phone with you, and my mind is aswirl with your bartending stories. I love hearing about the things you say to people who don’t have clue and, more importantly, people who try to take advantage of you.

As I ready myself for work tonight, I can’t help thinking: why are you getting stronger as a result of your service industry job while I’m getting smaller as a result of mine?

In this game of social relations, I am mad doggie-paddling; my legs are kicking, my mind is racing with strategies for how to hold my own in this fucked up service world, but I’m more on the drowning side than the swimming.

I’ve got a tentative hypotheses: bartending rocks and waitressing sucks. Literally, I think waitressing is sucking out my soul and, frighteningly, feeding my inner sissy.

Since I alternate waitressing and bartending at Hotel Bar, I have the vantage point of being able to experience both worlds, though I am waitressing more than I am bartending, and that’s a problem.

At the end of a waitressing night, I feel used and exhausted. I feel frustrated with humanity in general and overwhelmed by the sexism still prevalent (in 2009!) in the world. As a waitress, I’m all like, “Yessir, nomaam, sorrysir, rightawaymaam,” and if I’m not, then I’m seen as some sort of bitch. I feel like there’s no way to win as a waitress—if I’m acquiescing and subservient, then people treat me and tip me like a second class citizen. So being polite and kind is simply fulfilling my role as a lesser human being. But if I’m not all acquiescing and shit, then I’m not fulfilling my role, and people don’t like that.

As a bartender, however, I don’t have to do any of that creepy sucking up shit. I can be a hard ass; I can tease customers and they love me for it, like the time a customer took out a pile of crumpled papers from his bag and laid it on the bar for me to presumably throw away for him. I cocked my head and said, “What, you think I’m your trash collector now? Anything else you need me to do? Tie your shoes for you?” He blushed deeply as his friends burst out laughing. And of course: GIANT TIP. If I were waitressing and I said that, I can only imagine the scene that would ensue. “Guards! Take this peasant away! She does not know her place! Off with her head!” And then they stuff their pockets with leftover fried chicken tenders (“and at such prices!”) and scurry out of the hotel in their imagined royal regalia.

When it’s my shift as the bartender, I immediately feel a sense of ownership over the bar. I interact with customers, I’m polite, but I don’t erase my personality in the way that waitressing requires me to do. Even though I’m working really hard, my movements and interactions feel more effortless than the tremendous energy it takes as a waitress to suppress myself. It’s exhausting being invisible. But even more than that, it’s bad practice.

If it’s true that our habits change us and make us who we are, then waitressing might even be dangerous for me. I am trying to work against erasing myself. Trying to grow rather than shrink.

But this is what I’ve got right now. I need this job.

Thank God I have writing, one place I can practice being visible!

love,
Stephanie

Panopticon

Dear Stella,

So, what up with owners and managers? Do you think they’re drawn to the job because they’re already wacko or do they slowly lose their minds over time?

Of course, I’m not sure the owner of my bar even exists. We have only written and oral testament of such Higher Power and well, let’s just say I’m not a woman of easy faith. We only ever see His henchmen, the managers, and I don’t think they’ve ever seen The Man Himself. The closest they’ve come is to the next level of henchmen, the upper middle managers, and then the cluster of interchangeable folk who go only by the name, “Corporate!”, a name almost always followed by an exclamation mark, as in “Corporate is coming!”

I’ve never seen Corporate personally; I always seem to be off that day, though I’m usually there when we’re getting ready for “the visit,” which could happen at any time, as apparently He/They thrive on the element of surprise. On these days we must scrub all the seats in the lounge, shine the stainless steel till we could see an errant food particle in our teeth in it if we so wanted. We date-dot the perishables, making up dates for questionable items (as food safety isn’t the issue here; it’s whether or not Corporate will find stickers on items that are supposed to have stickers.) We make sure the limes (!) are fresh, the sugar packets are well-organized, the glasses are polished to a screeching clarity. The managers breath their frantic breath on us, trying to convey the urgency of the situation. I imagine a room hidden in the back somewhere in which middle managers are strung up by their toes if one rotten lime is discovered.

Fear breeds prolifically in Hotel Bar. Authority, much like the lobby scent machine’s well-timed toxic mists disguised as frasia, gardenia, lilac, is diffused; it is everywhere and nowhere.

We encounter Authority in the barrage of sticky notes peppered with exclamation marks behind the bar, as if remnants from an epileptic sticky note fit. “Clean this!!!!” “Polish every night!!!!!” Or my favorite, the container of candy corn that appeared next to the register one day out of the blue, labeled clearly in a hurry (or burst of emotion), “For seasonal drinks only!!!!!”

At first I heeded the writing on the candy corn. Situated perfectly under the Camera That Sees All, I knew it must be a trick, like placing a raw steak by a dog with a sign “DO NOT EAT,” or a baby next to a grandmother with a sign,“Do not hold baby!!!!!” Every time I’d slip a bill in the register, that Candy Corn would eye me, and then there, the taunting message demanding I keep my greedy little paws out. It didn’t help that nobody ever ordered the Seasonal drinks (filled with sickly sweet liquors) and so the candy corn just sat, uneaten.

This could only be some sick experiment, like on Lost: someone must be watching me right now, keeping a minute-by-minute log on my activities, noting (with a smirk) how many times I pick up the candy corn container, shake my head, and put it back. Or how many times I pass the register to see if the candy corn is still looking at me cock-eyed. Or even more eerie—how many times I think about the candy corn.

I even thought about buying my own candy corn to place by the off-limits version so that when The Man Behind The Camera came to read me my rights, I’d whip out my candy corn package, put it against His and say, “But I’ve done nothing wrong!” batting my eyelashes innocently.

The candy corn began taking up so much of my energy and time—I’m not eating the candy corn, I’m not eating the candy corn, I’m not eating the candy corn—that I finally couldn’t take it anymore. One night, I ripped open the top, grabbed a fistful of forbidden waxy kernels, looked up at the camera, and shoved the whole shebang into my mouth. I stared and chewed and stared and chewed. That’s right, I silently dared the Camera, I’m eating the candy corn.

The problem, of course, is that Punishment at the Hotel Bar is not logical. It gets doled out randomly and at anytime. God forbid you actually get punished for the thing you intentionally decided to get punished for; that would send the message that Punishment is predictable, and that you might be able to control it.

Who will ever know whether last night’s surprise event—over 100 people which someone must have known about—was punishment for the candy corn. Or perhaps it was a reminder from Corporate that we must always watch our backs. Even the middle manager on duty—Nicemanager—was punished, as no one told her about it either.

After the angry mob (“We were promised plates of food! We were promised a waitress who would take care of our every needs!”) had finally left, I came across NiceManager in a corner of the kitchen, inhaling chips and spinach artichoke dip, shaking her head, whispering to herself, mouth full, “What a disaster. What a disaster.”

“Are you okay?” I asked.

She continued to eat, then suddenly her eyes widened. She looked up at the ceiling and darted her eyes at each corner. “There’s no camera in here, is there?” she asked, panicked.

I saw only sprinklers, so I shook my head. “I don’t think so,” I said, “I think you’re safe.”

Though I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was watching us.

love,
Stephanie

Waitress

Dear Stella,

At The All-American in NYC, I was surrounded by wait staff and bartenders who wanted to be something else. Jessica would boom out Beyonce and Mary J. Blige songs every time she’d swing by the service bar for her cokes and sprites. Carl dreamed of recording an album and getting the fuck outta that place.

Isn’t it funny? I thought, Here are servers wanting to be artists, and I’m an artist aspiring to be a server. I’m on the backward track, wanting to be good at what they seem to do effortlessly. I felt comfortable, then, in my notion of myself as a writer doing this crazy thing for the “experience” and the “material.”

Things feel different from here. My novel has been out in the world for months, and no publisher seems to want it. A story I sent out to an editor who specially requested it from me was rejected, and I can’t remember the purpose of keeping a blog. Reasons why I shouldn’t take these rejections personally circle around me, filled with words like “recession,” and “layoffs,” and “the end of the book.” But I can’t really feel them.

Instead I feel as if Who I Am is a waitress—a waitress who is treated badly, is knee-deep in debt, and who aspires to be a writer.

love,
Stephanie

Creative Crisis

Dearest Stella,

I miss you. As you’ve told me, you’re taking a break from the blog, and I feel your absence profoundly.

I have thought about writing all week. I have tried to write. Without you on the other end, I can’t remember how to put sentences together. Nothing feels right. Everything is jumbled. The tenuous writing contract with the self has once again been revealed.

When I write, I imagine you listening, and I let myself live in the fantasy, I suppose, that my words might mean something to you, that I might matter. This is the big difference between the Idea of Audience and a specific person to whom one writes.

One of the many things I love about you is that you listen in order to try to understand, not to fashion a tightly wound argument or to show off your knowledge of such and such. We talk and write to share and learn. You make me think; you keep me engaged with the work of living. I look forward to your blog posts like Christmas morning. What will you show me today about this world in which I live? What will you make me think about? What will you change about the day’s make-up so that I discover it anew?

Dawn has been trying to get her students to understand the power of a creative crisis. Seasoned writers know that crises are part of the work we do and that they are necessary for a writer’s growth. We are as much psychological warriors as we are craftsmen.

And yet, each crisis feels as if it is the end of the road, even though each one before felt like the end and it wasn’t.

This crisis, too, feels giant, irrevocable. Yet even as the questions loom— Will our project together end? Will I write again? I know I must find a way to keep this going. Without writing, I lose faith in the everyday moments of my life. The big questions become bigger, and they swallow me. What is the point of bartending if I’m not writing about it and trying to understand the bigger picture? If I am just working and sleeping and using the money from working to pay for the house and gas and electric in the house in which I sleep and then which I leave to go to work?

I have to believe that the everyday has meaning, or rather, I have to do the work of making it mean.

Or what then?

When I suffered from paralyzing depression a few years ago, and my “work” was trying to get out of bed or brush my teeth once a day, one of the things that happened is that the external world was stripped of its resonance. When I’m well and I look at a tree, for example, it’s not just the thing—“tree”—but a kind of visual echo-chamber set off by the particular shade of orange or the slight bow of branches or the bright or muted light that falls upon them. As Virginia Woolf showed us about words in “Passing Russell Square,” these echoes, or non-verbal associations, multiply endlessly. I can neither record nor even consciously articulate the echoes, nor would I necessarily want to. I suck them up like a sponge to water; they expand me on a cellular level, each cell coming alive, fat and succulent with echoes of a life richly lived.

Depression depletes the thing of its resonance. All that nourishment, all that dimension—gone. The thing is revealed as only the thing. Tree. No life attached. And not just the tree, everything—the mug that holds my tea, the faux leopard print blanket that cradles me on the couch, my own skin, others’ skin. Empty shells, hollowed out of meaning.

Let’s fast forward to now, after battling the abyss, after making learning how to Live (with a capital “L!”) my “work,” I re-gained access to the echo-chamber. Miraculous!

The catch, of course, is that the underbelly of nothingness is also always there. Once you see the world stripped bare, the image lingers. Once you see that meaning is an illusion, what then? Some never come back from the vision of nothingness. Sometimes they can’t; sometimes they choose “truth” over “illusion”; sometimes human activity appears too shallow to be re-engaged in. I choose illusion. But not in a Matrix-I-choose-the-blue-pill desire-to-be-ignorant kind of way. No, I choose the red pill and I choose the work of making something out of nothing. It’s the hardest challenge of my life; I could say it’s the challenge of my life.

So today, I choose to write, no matter how difficult. No matter how stupid or worthless it feels, no matter that today I write into the abyss, against the echo of your absence.

I want to let you know how important you are to me. Because I don’t think you know it. No, that’s not true. I think you know it, but I don’t think you get it. How much the world needs you.

All this is to say, take your time, my dear friend. I’m not going anywhere. I will be here to listen when you are ready to write. I believe in you. I believe in us and our Project. This is not just a blog or a book we are making, but our lives. And yours matters to me.

love,
Stephanie

The Empathy Problem

It seems the empathy problem has followed me to Hotel Bar. I thought I could lick it by ignoring the news, switching the channel during ASPCA commercials, and leaving teaching so I would no longer bring students’ problems home.

I have a delicate ecoskeleton. Unlike the cockroach, which can survive Armaggedon, one conversation with a person in duress and I wilt and crumble under the weight of their pain.

No matter that Susan Sontag says empathy (or sympathy, I believe) can actually be dangerous socially because it can trick us into believing we are doing something by feeling and keep us from acting.

My body doesn’t care for such logic, though, especially after eight hours of running around, sans food and water, when I am pushed to my mental and physical limits.

Many of Hotel Bar’s “guests” are visiting loved ones in the neighboring hospital. They stand out right away because of their tired, weary looks; often they slump over the table and look far into the distance. In contrast, university professors are engaged in lively discussion with other colleagues and businessmen look all too eager for conversation.

“I could buy two gallons of ice cream for the price of this one bowl of vanilla,” one mother said to her daughter and husband. It’s true, of course, the prices are outrageous. The next night the family was prepared. “I’d like the cheapest beer,” the dad said. He was angry from the start, but because I knew they were visiting his mother, who wasn’t doing well, instead of being annoyed I felt the empathy tug. Maybe it’s because I have no outlet for feeling here—there is no possible action feeling might lead to—that I became so focused on the ice cream. If only I gave them more ice cream. If only I didn’t charge them so much for it. I asked the other bartender if I was allowed to give them dessert on me.

“It’s a dangerous practice to get into,” he warned. “You’ll get in trouble, for starters, but more than that, you’ll feel this way a lot working here.” He told me about a woman who came to the bar every day while her husband was dying in the hospital. “She had 3 weeks left with him,” he said, “and I was the only person she could talk to. I felt like crying every day.”

“Pretend you’re a doctor,” he said. “You’ve got to desensitize yourself or you won’t survive.”

The story of my life, it seems. But I can’t desensitize and I’m not sure I would want to anyway, although I understand its value, believe me. I must be like this for a reason, though, right? True, I can feel things to the point of paralysis, but also, in the way the act of drawing makes one see subtle details in the world, feeling is my link to sight; through feeling, the world comes into sharp focus.

So, with the care and precision of a surgeon, I lay out the tools: fork, knife, spoon. I offer warm bread and creamy butter as a salve. Wine and vodka and lager are our anesthesia.

My regular, who has been coming for weeks now to visit her husband with “black lung,” tells me they put tubes in him today. I don’t know what tubes she’s talking about, but I know it can’t be good. There is nothing I can do for her, of course, so instead, I have her milk ready as soon as she sits down. I remember her burger is to be well done and that she likes mayonnaise and ketchup and ranch dressing. I exchange her ashtray for a clean one at least twice as she smokes. So that for at least an hour, during the only meal I know she will have all day, she can feel tended to.

And last night? After the man with Parkinson’s fell and hit his head against the floor, his wife watching helplessly from a distance?

Hours later, lying in bed, I could not stop crying. I thought about the margarita I had made for him. Was it good? Did he enjoy it? I could have made it better, couldn’t I have? Feeling is not enough, of course; Sontag is right. What good does it do to focus on the margarita?

What good is one small bartender crying in the dark for a stranger and his wife?