“… and if customers could press a button and generate their drink immediately, they would. They don’t want to deal with you. You stand between them and their coffee. You’ll get here at four in the morning, bust your ass all day on bar, and none of it will matter because there’s too many people in line. You’ll be yelled at anyway.”
On my first day of barista training, my overworked shift lead relayed an embittered rant to me while shoveling coffee beans into a commercial grinder like coal into a steam engine. She moved through tasks with the ease of a machine.
“Just know this: baristas get more abuse than anyone else in food service,” she concluded. When a nearby manager overheard this, they laughed and agreed. “Thick skin is necessary,” He added, looking at me intently.
I wasn’t convinced at the time. Working in the food service industry felt like performing in a circus on fire, and I’d been dancing through the flames since turning sixteen. I’d soothed my fair share of agitated customers and swapped grievances with burnt-out colleagues more times than I could count. This hardboiled manager was nothing unusual, and while I’d never been ‘on bar’ before, I didn’t expect anything worse than the typical grind. (Pun intended, sorry.)
In a way, she was right. Barista-ing can be incredibly demanding. My career began in a hectic six-month blur, one I’d burned the candle at both ends for. I worked exhausting shifts, either leaving the house three in the morning for weeks on end or hanging my apron up around midnight. It wasn’t unusual for me to be ‘on bar’ for the duration of an eight-hour shift, straining tired eyes to catch every wild detail of guests’s preferences on the little white labels. (One time I was forced to put ten pumps of cinnamon dulce syrup and five pumps of white mocha sauce in a tall matcha latte, and in passing this little Frankenstein’s monster to the drive-thru barista, we exchanged glances as if turning the keys for a nuclear strike.)
The position thankfully comes with endless access to caffeine — it helps you to be ready for anything at all times. Our worst day, for instance, was the Fourth of July — our staff predicted a storm, but instead we weathered a category four tornado of thirsty, hungry crowds. We sold out of every single pastry item we had in stock, ran out of grande to-go cups by noon, and all matter of trash littered the dining room floors like tumbleweeds. Only the store walls and five ravaged employees within them were left standing by the holiday’s end.
Melodrama aside, ‘bad days’ were always our busy days. Long wait times were the common catalyst of customer meltdowns. Guests were generally pleasant — up until you inconvenienced them.
Incidents were less frequent, yet more explosive, at my second barista job, where the wealthy clientele had limited patience for human error. Fast-paced became high-pressure: for the price, location, and company brand, it was necessary to impress. I could make a latte fast, but couldn’t pour a flower in micro-foam. I’d never given open-hand service to tables before. I learned that the caramel-covered macchiatos I was used to were completely unrelated to the traditional drink. I was shaped into a qualified barista within a year, but it was a tight-rope journey of growth with a hawk-eyed audience of the uber-wealthy watching every misstep of the way.
Vocalized frustrations stung worse than angry glances or disappointed head shaking. Complaints ran the gamut from a simple, ‘I’d love to know why it’s taking so long’, to the oft-mocked, ‘I need to speak to your manager’. (They’d often be working alongside us through the chaos, and would repeat whatever sterile answer we’d offered them three times before.) And I always loved the famous ‘‘I’m never coming back!’ most, because they always would.
While my old shift lead had a point, there were so many friendly and patient customers among the rude ones. I landed two great jobs from customers, one being a freelance writing position, the other a dog-sitting gig for the building owner (high-end apartment, high-maintenance dog). I once convinced myself that God sent me a sign to switch careers in the form of a kind airline stewardess, who talked for ten minutes about how great her job was, insisting that there were ‘plenty of openings’ at her airline. Though I didn’t pursue it, I’ve never forgotten her thoughtfulness.
Most notably, I met my fiancé behind the coffee counter. He was a handsome regular at my second barista job, a coffee shop in the ski town we unknowingly shared. S came for the downstairs gym and the co-working space, always stopping by the counter to flirt. He’d always order his coffee black, despite (as I’d later discover) not even liking coffee in the first place.
The people-watching was fantastic, too. Throughout my career, I greeted happy couples, bright-eyed babies, tired coworkers from down the street looking to wake up, and easygoing regulars. I’d encourage a chronically-frazzled businesswoman to treat herself before she commuted two hours south, whip up ‘puppucinos’ for four-legged drive-thru guests, and brought piping hot mugs of black coffee to a group of very old men that would come in one-by-one, only minutes after the store opened on Saturday mornings. Many of them have passed on since, and I feel honored to have contributed to their weekly ritual.
I work remotely now. I’m a full-time content writer, and to be a paid for my writing (especially remote) has been one of my life’s loftier goals. And yet, I find myself reflecting often over those random interactions.
I even catch myself missing the long hours of latte-making; the minutia of stocking, prepping, and labeling; preparing for rushes with a trustworthy team of baristas. I miss dialing the espresso machine and taste-testing espresso until it was just right (or once I started involuntarily vibrating). During slower moments of napkin folding and melting chocolate into mocha sauce, I’d scribble poetry on my order-sheets and tuck them in my pocket for later adaptions.
There was something charming about it all — but nostalgia can make any dull thing from the past shine like gold. Maybe it wasn’t gold considering the stress, but there was something valuable in it nonetheless; enough for me to reminisce.
There’s an allure about the coffeeshop and an art to barista-ing that I long for often. I loved taking care of the people who came in for a pick-me-up, especially those who needed a smile and a genuine ‘how are you doing?’ along with it.
I find that occasional bad interactions are preferable to none. Writing remotely is wonderful, but admittedly, it can get lonely.
Kurt Vonnegut described the bliss in those passing interactions best:
“Oh, [his wife] says, well, you're not a poor man. You know, why don't you go online and buy a hundred envelopes and put them in the closet? And so I pretend not to hear her. And go out to get an envelope because I'm going to have a hell of a good time in the process of buying one envelope. I meet a lot of people. And, see some great looking babes. And a fire engine goes by. And I give them the thumbs up. And, and ask a woman what kind of dog that is. And, and I don't know. The moral of the story is, is we're here on Earth to fart around. And, of course, the computers will do us out of that. And, what the computer people don't realize, or they don't care, is we're dancing animals. You know, we love to move around. And, we're not supposed to dance at all anymore.”
Maybe it’s not just nostalgia that makes my memories glow.
Maybe I’m just missing the dance.
w/ lots of love,
Constanze
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actually changing up your habits
Another excellent piece!
I love this!!! Your best smile bringer yet!
Thanks, constanze....you made my night!