IGKTW Round 1 - The Bartender (820 hits)
Category: GeneralRating: 1.19 on 28 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (View user info) at 2006-04-20 09:57:54 EDT
As a bartender I've seen it all and heard it all. I've seen happy drunks engaged in drunken tomfoolery, I've seen regulars who drink cause they've got nothing else to do, the people who can make this job hard to deal with are the ones brought low by life. The ones that are living examples of just how hard life can be.
My bar is nothing special; it's in a small town full of small town happenings. If you've never lived in a small town you might not know how this works, hell might not even believe it, but I'll try to explain. In a small town everyone knows your business, that really doesn't cover it so let me be a little more explicit because that's the only way I know how to convey how deep that statement really is. In a small town everyone knows what color your asshole is on Thursday morning after you were out drinking the whole night away. As a bartender in a small town, I know what color it is on the inside. You see, people do talk to me, they talk and I listen, its part of the job. So I hear about the good, I hear about the bad, I hear about the ugly, and sometimes all of that is wrapped up in what I hear about the ones brought low by life, the people living the hard times.
"Hey Mike, how's it goin tonight? I'll have a brandy seven please."
I pour the booze, collect payment, and it begins.
"You hear about JW?"
Funny thing is I don't talk much during these conversations; I listen and most times am taken for a ride through someone else's life.
"He got picked up again last night. That's his sixth DUI. He's goin to jail for sure this time and his old lady and his kids are the ones that'll pay for it. JW ran up the credit cards gambling and drinking while Christy was home with the kids trying to make a home for his family. Now she's got some kind of weird cancer and ain't expected to last too long. They can't afford the treatments so she's just kind of wasting away. Saw her myself yesterday and she looks like a walking bag of bones. The kids are young and don't get what's happening all they know is those county people been showin up to the house askin questions. I think they're gonna take those kids and put em in a home or something. They've a hard row to plow ahead of them, and their daddy ain't gonna be there to help them with the work."
This is a ritual repeated several times over in a night. I might hear the same story from five different people or I might hear five different stories. More often than not the stories are of the people we all know who are forced to their knees, the ones who have nowhere to go, nowhere to hide.
"The usual Joe?"
"Yeah."
Joe's been coming in here for the last three months. Always drinks JD and water but rarely gets drunk. His story could be made into a tragic comedy of sorts. He's nearing the end of a divorce. A divorce he never saw coming until the day his wife told him she was pregnant and leaving him. He knew then because he and his wife hadn't had sex in over three months. He was pretty rough the first few months, lamenting the way life had of playing dirty tricks. He thought he was on top of the world, that things were finally going his way and suddenly he finds out his wife got knocked up and was leaving him for some personal trainer from the city, that life was dropping a big load of steamy, stinky, corn filled crap right in his lap. She didn't just leave him though; she left him with nothing he valued. He still had the house and stuff but this is a man who lived for his family, every struggle he'd been through to provide for them mattered because of them and now it was all gone.
A man can be brought low in many ways and it truly depends on the person how low they go. My life is good; I'm content and happy for the most part. But every night I work and hear the tales of others I am brought low. I'm brought low knowing the service I provide is not really helpful to these people. In fact it's often a contributor to their problems. It's not my job to worry about that but booze has a way of making hard times harder and yet people seek it out. They seek out the numbness they can find, for a short time, in the bottom of a bottle. The scary thing is I know I seek out that same numbness, that same opportunity to withdraw from life.
I could tell you hundreds of other stories, people losing their jobs, their homes, people dying, people laid up by injury and unable to work to pay for food. I hear it all hear and it makes me wonder how it's possible for life to be so hard. How it's fair for one man to live carefree while another suffers physical, emotional, sometimes soul rending pain. How it's possible for the man who's living carefree to suddenly find himself brought low and living a nightmare, suffering hard times.
I live the hard times of so many it's a wonder sometimes that I can have the life I want, but I sometimes wonder if being surrounded by people brought low gives me the perspective to be able to believe I am happy, that life isn't so bad for me. Hard times are a bitch and nobody wants to be brought low but I know that I'll always have business and part of that business will be hearing the tales of others who are down, beaten, and living it rough.
User Reviews
Submitted by gank (user info) at 2006-04-27 13:33:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
1.5
Submitted by gank (user info) at 2006-04-27 13:33:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I would only be repeating what the reviews below have said.
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-04-25 12:33:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
This seems like a bit of a false start to me, or maybe a half step.
You've written a good frame to tell a story in, but you just present the frame here instead.
Now I want to listen to Dave Matthews' "Bartender." Thanks for that.
Submitted by badassmofo (user info) at 2006-04-25 09:58:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I liked this, real.
Submitted by rad1101 (user info) at 2006-04-25 08:46:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
since when is everybody a goddamn literary genius?
Submitted by redskieslookfake (user info) at 2006-04-22 11:19:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Not bad
Submitted by mikethescottish (user info) at 2006-04-22 07:55:10 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
This is good- I just feel that with a little more detail, particularly on the characterisation, this could have been damn good.
Submitted by CaptainThorns (user info) at 2006-04-21 09:06:01 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-04-20 16:56:20 (#)
Ranking: 1
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-04-20 15:52:38 (#)
Ranking: 1
This was good... but there wasn't really any hook here, either in story or character. Not saying it's shit, it just didn't GRAB.
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-04-21 00:38:31 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
I liked the idea you were going for here, and there must be many a good blues story a bartender can tell. I would have liked to see you elaborate a bit more on it though; I agree with Jack that it could use more of a hook. It's only round one, so that's OK, more to come.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-04-20 16:58:42 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
OH MY GOD GHOLA! I TOLD YOU TO RATE IT HONESTLY! I THOUGHT WE HAD SOMETHING! I'M GONNA LOSE CAUSE OF YOU NOW!
thanks god it's time to go home.
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-04-20 16:56:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-04-20 15:52:38 (#)
Ranking: 1
This was good... but there wasn't really any hook here, either in story or character. Not saying it's shit, it just didn't GRAB.
Submitted by Stuch (user info) at 2006-04-20 16:17:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This struck a chord with me.
I haven't got many problems in my life, but goddamn do I moan about the few that I do have to bartenders.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-04-20 16:08:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I see how it is Jack, rate this post but not the post that was spawned by your querry for competitors of sorts: http://www.ubersite.com/m/85775.
WHY DO YOU TREAT ME THIS WAY?!!!
um.... thanks for the input and I do understand.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-04-20 15:52:38 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
This was good... but there wasn't really any hook here, either in story or character. Not saying it's shit, it just didn't GRAB.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-04-20 15:32:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I reluctantly agree. For me a bar tends to be a happy place. I get to drink tasty beverages flirt, play bar games, and generally carry on. I do know though that there is this darker side and I tried to capture that as well as I could here. oh well, win some lose some.
Submitted by MyNameIsTim (user info) at 2006-04-20 15:27:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
good, but not great. your earlier bartender post was much better...this just kind of...i don't know...was.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-04-20 13:55:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
hahaha sphagnum, you have more than a fair chance here. What's with the nobody's ever heard of stuff all the time? It's not like I go out announcing i'm famous or even believe that and I don't think I act like king shit or anything. Do I? I haven't responded to it before but I think you must be trying to goad me or something. what gives?
Submitted by Sphagnum (user info) at 2006-04-20 13:40:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
+2 because you're that guy who nobody has ever heard of who has to try and beat me.
Submitted by Crystle (user info) at 2006-04-20 12:55:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I liked it... It was filled with the emotions a typical blues song is.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-04-20 11:22:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
haha, you funny guy.
Submitted by Shlongy (user info) at 2006-04-20 11:18:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I changed my mind.
Give this fucking story some +2's or I'll shit-bomb -2 all of your posts, kids.
That oughta do it.
Submitted by MonkeyingAround (user info) at 2006-04-20 11:02:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
ehe... it just didn't do anything for me.
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-04-20 10:32:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
This was decent, but I think it could have and should have been expanded further.
Submitted by Shlongy (user info) at 2006-04-20 10:30:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
This'll make your post look better.
http://www.ubersite.com/m/86828
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-04-20 10:16:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
It's more than that though. the barman truly does hear it all, breakups, hookups, fights, kisses, all of it.
Submitted by Beano312003 (user info) at 2006-04-20 10:10:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
I always wonder why people think that a barman wants to hear how bad their day has been.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-04-20 10:05:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
link to the contest post: http://www.ubersite.com/m/86802
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2006-04-20 10:03:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Not sure I caught what I was looking for but this is kind of a companion to this: http://www.ubersite.com/m/86291. I'm fascinated by the stories that bartenders have and the dynamics of bars in general