Bartending is a gig you won’t find in a self-help book on motherhood as a way to prepare yourself for what’s to come, but if you don’t yet have kids, it may be time to pick up a weekend gig. As a bartender, I handled so many weird, unique and stressful situations.
Nightmares
I worked at J.Alexander’s all through grad school and the bartenders commonly discussed our “J-Mares,” i.e., having a nightmare that you were “in the weeds,” or completely overwhelmed, forgetting an order, having too many customers to serve, etc. As a mom, I’ve woken up many times thinking I forgot to turn in a form to school, didn’t give one of my kids their medicine, or left a load of laundry sitting too long and would need to rerun. This is adulting at its best, I suppose.
Vomit
Yep – I’ll throw the gross one in first, but bartending sometimes includes some pretty gross stuff. It’s actually a question on Reddit – whether or not you have to clean up after yourself if you puke in public. Seriously?! Unfortunately, with kids, it can come with no warning, projectile onto every single surface of your home and vary in consistency. Luckily, when it’s your kids, it’s a little less awful as you know where it came from.
Multitasking
Dinner and snack time often consists of three small humans shouting three separate requests for food and beverage, specifying down to which color bowl they want me to put it in and what is and isn’t allowed to touch. Sounds so much like the bar orders I’d have barked to me, letting me know precisely how many ice cubes in the mojito or placing the blue cheese stuffed olives at the top of the toothpick so they didn’t ruin the martini. Yes. This is a thing. But seriously – multitasking is no fun, but I have yet to find a way around it. Listening to their stories while doing math in my head at Kroger to get the best deal on my dish detergent. Or trying to listen to Siri tell me where I’m going as the Paw Patrol blares in my ears and the kids are asking me for snacks.
Holding it
As a mama, there just isn’t always time to pee. Kids need something, the laundry buzzer goes off, etc. Bartending is no different. Break time? Yeah, good luck.
Balancing all the things
My kids simply can’t be bothered to hold their own cups, so instead, I’m usually juggling all three in my left hand as I unlock the door with the other. Just as I juggled Cosmos in my left as a rung someone out with my right, learning how to make the most of your situation (and finding new purposes for your body parts, like how to use your elbow when your hands are full) may just be the answer.
We can’t have nice things
I’ve literally cried over family heirlooms and other treasures I have that are sitting in boxes. If you haven’t yet, you may soon have to put all the nice things up, as having kids means we can’t have nice things. When I bartended, I once dropped a $300+ bottle of wine on the floor when I was doing my weekly cleaning and remember the sinking feeling I had knowing that I was responsible, should have known better, but it happened. We just can’t have nice things.
There’s always a counter to wipe
Am I right?! Seems like a dish towel is always in my hand as there’s always a spill, a leaky supply cup or something. Bartending is no different. How don’t I have my own monogrammed towels, though? Hmm.
So many memories and nightmares over the years of late nights that while I wouldn’t necessarily want to do again, I’m grateful for the lessons learned.
