Feeling like I’m breathing my last breath
Feeling like I’m walking my last steps
Look at all of these tears I’ve wept
Look at all the promises that I’ve kept

I put my all into your hands
Here’s my soul to keep
I let you in with all that I can
You’re not hard to reach

And you bless me with the best gift
That I’ve ever known
You give me purpose
Yeah, you’ve given me purpose

I know I need to take a break from social media, and maybe life, because I’m a little off the rails right now, but I’ll hone it in. For now I need to share this story because it gives me goosebumps and makes my knees weak. This story makes me excited like a fucking child. This is a story of my purpose, unreasonable hospitality.

If you’ve been reading along long enough you know that Will Guidara’s book unreasonable hospitality, is essentially the Bible for me. It’s one of the only books I never got bored while reading, and I’ve read it over and over, and listened to it in the car and given out like 50 copies. It’s so so good. The basic message of the book is: the remarkable power of giving people more than they expect.

In hospitality, the restaurant setting specifically, each guest comes in with a similar expectation. They’ll come in, be greeted warmly by the host, check in, and be seated. From there a server will go to the table and offer them water, and then take a drink order. After drinks get to the table the server will typically go over and ask if they have any questions about food and if there’s anything they’d like to start with. From there they get appetizers, a main course, maybe dessert. When people put in the notes that there’s a special occasion: Anniversary, birthday, date night, etc. They may expect a congrats, a happy birthday, whatever it may be. Maybe a splash of champagne.

In the world we’re currently existing in, the cost of living is outrageous, as is the cost of dining. So what if we took those expectations, and peppered in some things they never saw coming?

For example, when I go to a table with one of these gestures, I always get names first. I’ll walk to the table with champagne flutes and say “happy 30th birthday, so & so.” Hey how are you happy anniversary, how many years?

I’ll give you an example of beating expectations. Couple comes in on Wednesday, 40th wedding anniversary. I happened to get a bottle of 40 year old rum that day, that is outrageously expensive, but 40 and 40 how could I not? the rum comes in this beautiful oak box and it’s secure like you have a bar of gold inside. I go to the table and I say, I’d probably lose my job for this but it’s too good not to do. I’m going to pour you each a small taste of this rum, it’s a 40 year old Jamaican rum that there’s only 317 bottles of in the world. They were from Australia and couldn’t believe what I was doing. I poured what I would charge someone $400 for worth of rum for them to enjoy with dessert. On their way out they shook my hand and said they’d never forget the night. What a beautiful thing to hear.

Tonight though, tonight we did something so unreasonable I’ll be sharing this story until the day I die.

We had a 28 person wedding tonight, and when it was time for dessert the bride and groom said they didn’t want to cut the cake because they were too embarrassed to do it in front of their guests. Queue the cartoon light bulb.

“what if you could cut the cake without doing it in front of your guests?”

We’d love to.

Consider it done.

Me and Tony went into action. We cleared the kitchen area where we keep dirty glasses and trash and all the bad stuff, mopped the floor, set a table with a white table cloth, the cake, a bottle of champagne on ice, two flutes, a knife, and of course a single white rose. We kicked the staff out and invited them into the kitchen to cut their cake together, just them, in our kitchen, with a champagne toast. They freaked. “you guys just made the night, this is unbelievable. You guys are so amazing”

A simple gesture, that costed the restaurant $0, but made the bride and groom feel as special as ever. It was one of my career highlights.

It’s not about how much money the gesture costs, it’s about making it a gesture you couldn’t possibly give you anyone else that night. It’s about hospitality being one size fits one. Every guest having different needs and meeting them. Fucking exceeding them.

They say when you die that some of your life memories flash in your eyes, for me I hope that makes it into what I see before I head to the other side, because it filled my cup.

Anyone who’s been following along recently knows I’ve been struggling with my mental health, more anxious than usual, more suicidal ideation than usual, more depression than usual.

To be honest the past week or two I’ve felt a little like I don’t have a purpose, or like I’ve already fulfilled my purpose and maybe my life is coming to an end.

The pursuit of making others feel seen and heard, making them feel cared for, and taking care of them, is not easy. I’d never say I have an easy day of work. Each day we serve 100’s of guests, and you want everyone to be happy, which ultimately is harder than you’d think. Then there’s the part of connecting with guests, but there being a weird gray area because it’s part of your job to remain professional, but sometimes the walls come down and you really connect. Navigating that is no easy task.

Tonight brought my purpose back a bit, while I still feel a little lost at sea, I will say I always have this thing that makes me feel again when things go numb. I wish I could say this is the end of my feeling lost. I wish I could say this was the end of my struggling thoughts, but we’ll wake up tomorrow and be right back at it.

I’ll admit that my struggles recently have made me lash out a bit, and short with others. Just because I’m struggling doesn’t mean I can take it out on others, so I apologize to anyone I’ve been rude to. I own that I should learn better behaviors, and I am working on it.

Feeling like I’m breathing my last breath
Feeling like I’m walking my last steps

Stay well,

J.