I heard a passage from Waiting on NPR's All Things Considered, and decided I had to have this book. I bought it on my way home, began reading it on the way out of the bookstore, became disgruntled if anything interrupted my reading, and finished the book by the next afternoon. It was good.
Most of us, as Ginsburg points out, have waited tables at one time or another, but even if you've never worked in a restaurant, you've probably held some sort of menial service job, and that's close enough. You know how demanding and particular people can be; how otherwise egalitarian folks turn into elitists when seated at a table; the impossible demands of the management and tensions/liaisons among the waitstaff. It's all in there.
Several times, in the middle of a chapter, I would shout an exalted "Yes! That's it!" to no one in particular. I read many passages aloud. Ginsburg's voice is a reliable and witty one, with a skilled dry humor that leaves an appropriate amount of verbiage to the imagination. She chronicles her 20-year waiting career; the various restaurants she's worked at, the managers, her co-workers and, of course, the customers. The book moves along chronologically, starting at Ginsburg's first restaurant job: waiting tables at a diner during her sixteenth summer. During that summer, she learns how to carry several plates at once, handle finicky customers, and she meets her first - fleeting -- love. This stint sets the tone for Ginsburg's further waiting endeavors.
At first, through Ginsburg's high school and college years, the book moves slowly, documenting each restaurant, extrapolating each detail. After her graduation, however, Ginsburg's jobs begin to flow and mesh together, with only a few notable customers, friends and restaurants showing through the fray. I believe this was intentional; not only does this make what might have been a mundane list of restaurants - "And next, I worked at Hoover's..." - interesting, but it also illustrates the blur Ginsburg's life became at that time, a muddle of shocking sameness and the mark of a life of waiting tables: a search for something better.
Still, some customers - or types of customers - always stick out, and Ginsburg's depictions of them are dead on.
It's so true; people turn into different creatures in a restaurant.
Ginsburg's account is well-written, and often brutally honest with personal details that are tied inextricably to her work as a waitress. She includes excellent chapters on tipping and the sexual tension (and acts) that a restaurant inspires among the staff. The only low point, if one can call it that, is a chapter on society's perceptions of waitresses, and, more specifically, a list of movies and television shows that feature and, often, typecast waitresses. The list - and the synopses - don't make for very interesting reading. But this is not important. The important thing is: read this book. It is hilarious, insightful, and well written. And, if you've ever worked in a restaurant, it will make you feel sooo vindicated.
