Playing games at the bar

Bartending can be a lot like Whack a Mole, the old arcade game where a rodent’s head pops up out of a hole, and you whack it down with a wooden mallet. Only it isn’t really, because there is no whacking, and more importantly no mallet, just the popped-up heads.

“What can I get you?” I asked one of those heads as it popped up.

 “Oh nothing, I am just watching you work,” said the mouth in that head.

In the bar business you can usually tell when someone wants something. There is a certain angst that happens. People crumple up their hands, or they wave their arms, or they signal you with one finger. Or they don’t and you have to guess. Because some people will never let you know that they want something. They expect you to ask. Every single time. And that doesn’t always happen, especially in a busy bar.

I was assembling the Basil Smash and Strawberry Mojito by lining up the glassware, filling the shaker glasses with ice, and then adding the liquid ingredients before tearing the herbs and placing them on top: basil for the Smash, and mint for the Mojito.

I just happened to look up at that very moment and looked right into the eyes of a wanting woman. Its not always hands, its sometimes eyes. In fact, it’s almost always the eyes.

“What can I get you?” I asked her eyes.

“Excuse me!” said her friend to her immediate right, putting her on my immediate left. “I wanted to order.”

“I’m sorry,” said her friend. “You go.”

Instead of ordering, Lefty did something else.

“Obviously, he likes you better,” she said to her friend. A fact that wasn’t obvious, nor even factual.

In actual fact, I hadn’t formed an opinion either way. They were just two of the three women sitting directly in front of me. I could have looked at either one, I just happened to look at her friend first.

“No Susan, you go. You always go first,” said Lefty.

“I’m sorry Patty, he just looked at me.”

“No, you always get your way. People always like you better. You go first,” said Patty.

I was busy shaking the two drinks now. And witnessing whatever it was that was going on right there in front of me.

After shaking and serving the two drinks I looked at Patty.

“What’ll it be?” I asked.

You’d think that someone so insistent on going first would be ready. And you’d be wrong, just like I was. Patty asked for a drink menu. And then her friend and I, and her other friend stood or sat there looking at her. For some people, ordering in a restaurant is their moment in the sun. A time to make comments, ask questions, giggle, or even to study in silence, all while others are waiting. What that moment isn’t, is a time to place an order.

Susan was just as stuck as me because every time she began to interact, Patty silenced her with a look. And from where I stood, it certainly didn’t look like a look of friendship.

There are moments when we get to see psychology on full display, and this was one of those moments. I suspect it had nothing to do with indecision, instead it had to do with something intangible. Like the ability to make everyone else wait, while she made a decision.

You see this with people who are chronically late or always need to be the last one to leave, or the first one in, or out. Susan saw it too. But for whatever reason she sat back and participated. When she tried to talk, she was interrupted, when she made a point, it was contradicted. And it went far beyond ordering.

“What color was the car that almost hit you?” asked Patty, for reasons unknown.

“I don’t know,” said Susan. “Yellow?”

“What shade of yellow?”

“Does that matter?”

“I am just curious what kind of yellow you are talking about.”

“I wasn’t talking about yellow; I was talking about almost having an accident.”

“So, you don’t know what kind of yellow it was?”

Soon enough it was my turn. And Patty already didn’t like me. Mainly because I had looked at Susan first.

“Aren’t you going to ask her?” said Patty pointing at Susan when I asked her if she wanted another drink.

“What about your best friend over there,” she said when I tried to take her food order first.

“He obviously likes you better,” said Patty smugly.

Leaving me with these thoughts:

-It’s hard to play the game if you don’t know the rules, or the game.

-You should never be less so that someone else can be more, especially if their being more is conditional upon that less.

-“Two types of people tell you not to learn manipulation. Naïve people, and manipulators,” wrote social scientist and author Lucio Buffalmano.

-I certainly didn’t start out liking Susan better, but somehow, I sure ended up there.