Okay, so, I know I just did this but when it rains it pours, right? If you want to check out the vintage tips, here are the links: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine and ten. Share them if you have some badly behaving friends. Or if you like to judge badly behaving people. Or if you just think it’s funny. Or not at all. Whatever. I’m not the boss of you.
So at this point some of you are probably all “this girl hates people and bartending and maybe she should just get a new job.” You can feel free to think that. Personally, I think I am doing a public service on behalf of all the other drink slingers who are annoyed by poorly mannered patrons. I am also a firm believer that when someone is acting like an asshat, the rest of us can feel free to judge them, and even have a few laughs at their expense, without feeling bad about it. So, without further ado, another bit of free advice from yours truly. Unless of course you’d like to pay me. In which case, yes please can you email me immediately?!
So I am not a person who really likes to be touched. When everyone else is hugging and cheek-kissing and all that stuff, I have my arm outstretched in front of my body and my hand furiously moving about in an enthusiastic wave. I find that if I approach it this way, I am able to create a friendly barrier. It’s like, yea, I like you, I will happily interact with you, but only when you are at least 2 feet away from me. The outstretched arm is sort of like the enforcer of my invisible force field. And that is with people I know. If I don’t know you, don’t touch me. Seriously. I will curl myself into the smallest possible version of myself in all public circumstances in order to avoid any inadvertent bodily contact. I am not a hand holder, not a snuggler, not a fan of massages. So now that I have scared all my friends and have them all thinking
“oh my god I think I maybe gave her a hug once? Does she hate me?!”
I will continue with the tip. But only after I say this: it’s cool, friends, you can hug me. You’ve passed the test. Whatever that means.
So, the tip. I am aware that I am especially weird about touching, but I think I can speak for bartenders the world over when I say to you: do not touch your bartender. Seriously. Remember that lesson you learned in pre-school? You know, use your words? That also applies to ordering drinks. You have a voice. We have ears. Let’s make this work. So last night, when I was in the middle of a short conversation, one of my customers reached over the bar and poked me in the arm. He had been standing at the bar waiting for me for approximately 15 seconds. I know this because I saw him walk over, looked at him and smiled in the “I’ll be with you in a second” sort of a way. And then, because apparently waiting is so incredibly difficult especially when you have probably already had too many drinks, he poked me. In the arm. With his stupid index finger. I would not wish the glare I gave him on my worst enemy.
So maybe this doesn’t seem like a big deal to some of you but it really is. Being behind the bar is like being in a safe zone. As bartenders, we are protected by the expansive piece of wood that separates us from the clientele. Just imagine when you look at the bar that there is this invisible wall through which sound passes, through which drinks and currency pass, but through which your hands cannot travel. Just because we are giving you drinks and laughing at your jokes does not make us public property. We do not belong to you.
Okay, so, imagine that you are like, a computer tech person. You are one of those people that answers phone calls from people like me. People who know nothing about technology and need all the help all the time for the stupidest things. And let’s say that I have called you and I am on hold while you are trying to help some other technologically-challenged person. But let’s just say, for the sake of this tip, that I got impatient and I possessed the power, just like in the cartoons, to reach my hand through the phone and poke you on the arm to get your attention. That would be shocking, right? And not just because I had achieved a feat that previously seemed impossible. It would also be shocking because you’d be like,
“here I am, sitting at my desk doing my job and that asshole just reached through the phone and poked me on the shoulder! With her stupid index finger!”
And you know what? Your reaction would be absolutely justified because I should keep my hands to myself. So just think about it this way. The bar, it is like my desk. You are the technologically-challenged person on the other end of the phone. The space in between us is sort of like a phone cord. Imagine that it is impossible for you to touch me. Because here’s the thing. I know that you are at the bar with your friends having fun, but that doesn’t make it any less of a job for me. I am not your drinking buddy. I am helping you fill a need. The need for more alcohol. It is, although it might not seem this way to you, a professional interaction. I am a professional. And you don’t touch professionals.
franklyrebekah 
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