“…And I do believe that good done anywhere is good done everywhere. …” says Maya Angelou. I read this quote this morning as the header in a newsletter type message at work.
I am sick of people judging me when I say I work for Starbucks. Heck, even some people who come into the store and treat me like crap because I’m a barista! It is really unfair.
The other night I was having a pleasantly awkward, albeit interesting and engaging conversation with another playwright/artist that I had just met. We were becoming acquainted, blah blah blah, I mentioned something about work. She asked where that was and when I said Starbucks, she shut down with an unimpressed “oh.” The kind of “oh” that means “OH, I see. I get it. I know it all.”
That sort of “oh” is absolutely ridiculous. How dare someone sum up another person based on their part-time joe job that is paying for their scene studies and contemporary dance class? What does that mean?
Everyone who comes into our store is different and everyone who works at our store is different. Every…okay, MOST Starbucks are different. My store especially. We’re in Leslieville and serve everyone from mamas with strollers to cracked out, half-blind elderly women to tv and film producers and TTC drivers. Our baristas have studied philosophy, nursing, and microbiology. We are improvisers, photographers, cooks and world travellers.
And we are baristas! What’s so bad about that?
Based on where this woman went to school (a small artsy college in Halifax) I could have whipped up my own all-encompassing judgements in an “oh.” But I didn’t, because I was listening to everything else she was saying, answering her questions, and being open. I wasn’t making our meeting easy on myself by making assumptions. That isn’t how you reach out or connect, which as an artist, isn’t that what your first goal should be?
Okay, there are days when people come in and I whip up assesments in a snap. The difference between a “Quad espresso over ice in a grande cup” and a doppio long espresso is astounding. Skinny vanilla lattes vs iced green tea lemonades vs a personal ventie earl gray…
But I recognize I am taking the easy way out. And that I really don’t have a right to draw conclusions. But sometimes it’s not even 6:30 am and I haven’t had espresso and I make a little joke and get cold, unkind eyes glaring back and me and a million insults flash through my mind.
But the giddyness that comes from connecting with a customer and how many shifts I leave and walk home happy and elevated outweigh any sort of human hatred I may accumulate. I’m just a person in the world who needs to pay the bills, and Tammy and Ken and all the regulars just need their coffees. What kind of sad world would we live in if you could sum a person up based on the coffee they drink? How is that worse then sentencing people to a little box by the clothes they wear? The colour of their skin, dare I be so (grande?) bold.
Actually as I am typing this, a comic/playwright on CBC named Lewis Back just said “There is a Starbucks across the street from another Starbucks. This is the end of the Universe.” Starbucks gives all employees, part time or no, benefits. They work around their employees (partners, we call them) gorgeously. They pay the farmers more than fair trade wages and as soon as 2015, all beans will be e ethically sourced. Starbucks is also paired with Product Red, and they post their Corporate Social Responsibility reports on the web for all to see. To be held accountable. There is a reason why so many people all over the world drink Starbucks.
When we make mistakes “on bar” (aka behind the giant espresso machines, steaming milk and pumping chai syrup) and get flustered, one of us usually reminds the other, “it’s just coffee.” If I forgot you wanted a splenda in your latte, it’s ok. I’ll remake it. You get your coffee and I didn’t commit a crime, I made a mistake. People make their drinks out to be oh-so important, which can be frustrating or laughable at times, but then it’s my turn to order on my break and I’m having a double tall soy extra foamy latte, so who am I to judge, right?! Everyone needs to take a breath. It’s just coffee! (It’s the people who get pissed off at me when they see a street car go by and they haven’t got their pumpkin scone yet I really want to pummel! I don’t drive the tram, friends. And there are 6 billion Starbucks in Toronto, you didn’t have to come into this one if you’re in such a rush…ANYWHO.)
And you know what? We do get a lot of drinks right, have them ready on the bar before the customer even orders, treat them to extra shots of espresso if it’s poured and not needed, ask the people about their kids, their jobs, their order, their day.
I know in my heart I have brightened a few mornings, and have my mornings brightened in return. So what if it was done in a branch of a huge corporation?
You'll Never See My Eyes 