Waiter to the Rich and Shameless: Confessions of a Five-Star Beverly Hills Server (33 page)

There
was a time when I was very impressed with myself for getting and keeping this
job, for working so closely to the glitz and glamour of Hollywood, and for
being successful in such a competitive and thankless environment. I enjoyed
rubbing shoulders with the Crowes, Stewarts and Depps of the world even if it
was from behind a silver tray.  I believed that they needed me, that I was
somehow important and part of it all, and that perhaps I could be like them one
day.   When you spend forty hours a week immersed in the Cricket Room illusion,
you begin to believe it.   But my life couldn’t be further from that reality.  The
illusion became a delusion.  No matter how many $1,000 tips I made, I’d never catch
up to them.  I’d never be like them – and maybe that wasn’t a bad thing.  I’d
never have their kind of money. But then again I’d never be their kind of
shameless either. 

After
years of becoming accustomed to the thrill, I had finally evolved past that
naïve impression of myself and my job, and came to realize that I don’t care
about having money, at least not the way the Rich and Shameless do.  It’s a
means to an end, and necessary, but for them it’s a religion. They place it on
an altar above all else. Bottom line, what’s impressive to me isn’t money. 
It’s when someone is dedicated to their art or studies because they truly want
to share something that they’re convinced others can benefit from. I needed to
be that person. I needed to get back to who I truly am and stop kidding myself
about this bullshit world centered inside the Cricket Room.  I suddenly saw the
work for what it was, I saw our clientele for who they were, and most
importantly, I saw myself for who I am.  And that’s when I started growing
again.

A
huge sense of freedom overwhelmed me when I realized I was actually saying
goodbye.  Mr. P thought I was crazy, but we all know who’s really wearing the
straightjacket under his ill-fitting suit. All the money in the world isn’t
worth being miserable.  I had to leave while I still had an ounce of myself
left.  Pride, self-esteem, and integrity can’t be bought, not even by Johnny
Depp.

Maybe
I’ll take some time off or maybe I’ll open my own place; perhaps something
totally unexpected will come along like floral design or Zoomba instructor.  Or
maybe I’ll grow my hair back long, grow a beard, and become Swami Pauli. I’ll
give sappy life advice to bored LA housewives.

But
all joking aside, whatever happens, I am walking away and not turning back.  Bridge
burned to the ground, check.

After
I left the Cricket Room, I knew what I had to do to redeem myself in my own
eyes, but I wasn’t quite sure how to go about it.  My immediate goals were to
finish all of my writing projects, get back into a rock band, and reawaken my
creative soul within. I had to take a chance on myself and believe that I can
do it.  But I was haunted by the question:  why would things be different this
time?  I still had to make a living. This time, however, I felt a certain
centeredness, a reassuring confidence I hadn’t owned before.  Believe me, I
knew things would be a lot tougher than they had been for the last ten years
and I knew there would be nights when I’d be sniffling in my bed wishing I
could hide underneath that comforting security blanket that the Cricket Room
provided for us working grunts. Yet this time, I couldn’t go back.  I
wouldn’t.  I had to give it my best try, somehow. 

It
took some time to arrange my life so that I could pursue those ambitious goals.
I had to make many unexpected
adjustments due to my departure from the Cricket Room.  My entire lifestyle needed
to change.  Juliana and I no longer had money to travel or eat out or drink
fancy wines.  I won’t lie -- it’s been a tough lesson but one that has reminded
me how most people of my trade really live, how people of my former (now current)
income bracket are treated and how difficult and complicated our lives really
are. No paid health insurance, no 401K.  How could I have forgotten so quickly?
I suppose because I’m older now, those things really make a difference.  A most
humbling experience indeed.

I
dedicated a lot of time to my music, but to pay the bills I kept falling back
into my old ways:  service jobs. Through a placement agency in Beverly Hills I
ended up working for an elderly man in San Marino for a while as his
butler/chauffeur and when he became too ill and needed only medical staff, I
had to move on.  I then interviewed with Ellen and Portia to be the head butler
at their Beverly Hills house.  But luckily I didn’t get that job and finally
decided that day that I can’t be that buttoned-up fucking boring cardboard
figure of a waiter or butler that the Cricket Room had prepared me for so
well.  Instead I could see Dee Snyder’s face coming at me full-screen, yelling
“I
wanna rock!”
I am no longer willing to sell out for comfort and security,
and since Juliana is my biggest supporter and we don’t plan on having any kids,
why not live out my dreams, right?

Eventually,
through a few different musical collaborations, I created and placed songs for
three different films, and a TV show.  I joined an Italian choir of 40 plus
singers, and we trained for months for our performance of Mozart’s Requiem. The
concerts were backed by a 30-piece symphony orchestra and were held in Santa
Monica and Pasadena. It was an amazing and gratifying experience and something
I had always dreamed of doing.

In
the meantime I stayed in touch with most of my old co-workers through e-mail
and Facebook and met up with a few of them from time to time. I had lunch with
Mr. P a few times and invariably came away with the feeling that he had become
a thoroughly broken man.

Jens
had come back from Denmark -- apparently the Scandinavian lifestyle had been
too slow for him and in less than a year he had run out of space to roam. The
infamous thrill-seeking playboy could not be entertained enough to stay in
Copenhagen, especially after a dark and dreary northern winter.  His Angelino
roots were screaming to return.  Jens now works at a country club in Century
City and has been keeping busy knocking around tennis balls with lonely wives,
Andy Roddick and many others. I never knew it but Jens’s passion for sports had
always been piqued by tennis. He seems happy as a clam and is full of new
stories that still make my jaw drop to the floor.  I swear if I ever write
another book it’ll be about his life.

About
a year after leaving the Cricket Room, I visited again to enjoy dinner with
Juliana and a friend and to see all my old co-workers.  It was amazing, the
kinship and love I received.  Mr. P rolled out the welcome mat and we were
seated at the only four-top in the Cove.  Oddly enough, right next to the
Vanderpumps, with Courteney Cox in the booth next to them.  When my friend
asked if anyone famous was in the restaurant I had to laugh.  It was just a
typical night at the Cricket Room.  The ambiance sparkled as always, and the
same guitarist was there, on whom I had played that evil prank when Roger Waters
was dining in the Cricket Room.  He was singing in his best high-pitched
falsetto voice, performing his softie versions of top ten hits from 1960 to the
present.  The waiters all hovered about, catching me up on the latest.  There
were hugs and kisses all around, and none of the faces were new although they
had moved a few servers up from the lunch shift to fill my spot.

Both
Juliana and I were astounded at the warmth and genuine kindness of the staff. 
It was evident that they all missed me. Mr. P even joked
“Polli, go pour
water on table 44!”
  While the food hadn’t changed, the dining room had
undergone a solid makeover.  There were new, luxurious crown moldings adorning
the walls, some different pictures on the walls and some of the old ones had
beautiful new frames.  Overall the place looked even more rich and opulent, as
if that were possible. The only mediocre change in the dining room was the ugly
carpet.  It was boring and institutional and couldn’t hold a candle to the
original huge motif design that I described early in my story. 

The
cozy seating in the garden area had been replaced with solid booths and chairs,
sturdier tables and permanent overhead heating for night-time dining.  The
waiters told me that there were a lot of cosmetic changes but nothing that
really made a big difference.  There were now more service armoires placed
strategically throughout the whole restaurant and two extra POS (point of
service) computers, and
the
new GM  offered benefits to all his employees -- not just a select few as the
last tyrant did.
 It
gave me a sense of hope and at the same time a bit of sadness to think that
perhaps if I had held out a year or so longer many of my suggestions might have
been heeded.  But let’s face it, I wanted a change and a change I got.  I have
to admit it made things a little easier on me when Matt told me that despite
the upgrades, they were still running the place like a five-star Denny’s with a
skeleton crew.

S
hould I have walked away and
turned my back on an establishment that enabled a comfortable life for me? 
Would I have ever written this book if I had stayed?  Or the screenplay I just
completed?  Would I have
formed
an original rock band, completed a 13-song album, appeared in a TV pilot and
launched our video into heavy rotation on European music video TV stations? Our
manager even got us onto the ballot for Grammy consideration in eight
categories, which was a first for all of us in the band, and we are also
planning a tour of Europe and Asia.  In short, the future has never looked
brighter. 

I
can’t say whether any of this would have happened had I stayed in my relatively
comfortable life at the Cricket Room.  In life the unexpected happens and we
can’t do much more than try to hang on to ourselves as the road turns and
twists.
Funny thing
is, I feel this band and this book are my best work yet, and deep inside I know
that I could not have made it this far without my experiences at the Cricket
Room to push me to my limits and teach me about myself and my abilities. I
don’t look back too often anymore, as my focus has shifted to enjoying life
with Juliana and the future.

Thank
you, Cricket Room, and I bid you a warm and bittersweet good-bye.

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