Best Bad Man of the Year

Every year, the only decent, free weekly newspaper that exists in the semi-small town in which I live, publishes an anticipated “Best…Of” issue. Now, because of the size and business dynamic of this quaint town-by-the-sea, if your business is voted “Best…Of” for anything, you have gotten a big boost in the right direction. As I have discussed already, I work as a waitress in a small café that has an equally small staff. This humble establishment has about twenty tables, a staff of two cooks, one prep cook, one dishwasher, two bussers (the dish boy and the bussers only work on weekends) and three waitress, has been open for 35 years, has never expanded from its tucked-in–the-corner spot and barely has seemed to change the menu in the entirety of its existence. That’s right, all of the biscuits and gravy you dare to eat.

I am one third of the wait staff and I have been employed at the café for a little less than a year. As far as the other two thirds of the wait staff go, one is a little younger than me and has worked there about 4 months less than I; the other is a little older than me and has been working at this restaurant for seven years. It is the only job she has ever had, she has worked there longer than almost every other employee by a long shot. So, even though it is not really true, she is owns the place. People eat there to see her, customers ask her to housesit while they go to Europe, she knows almost everyone’s name and their kid’s names too. Neither I nor the other waitress can hold a candle to her popularity. We are merely by-standers watching someone else’s ship sail by.

Her ship really came in this year though. Guess who was the “Best Server Of” 2007---you don’t have to guess too hard. Not only did her victory prompt the owner to make several huge chalkboard signs proclaiming her amazing abilities in serving the best-meal-ever, but it’s basically over in all totality for me and the other "normal" server. We can no longer even pretend to think that we are good at our jobs. So—currently we (this is not the royal “we”) kinda wander through our day, heads down, confirming to our tables that----no, it is not us, it is the other one who is the Best Server Of The Year.

I am left to wonder, is this how George Bush feels? Does he look at Vice President Cheney and feel that, no matter how hard he tries, there will always be a politician who is eviler than he? No matter what, he will never be the “Best Bad Guy Of” any year? He is, and always will be, defeated in his mission to be the worst. Or, is he like me and whole-heartedly realize that, even though it is a bummer to be beat at your job hands-down, someone else really and truly deserves it.