Barguide: The journalist bartender

So I got a job as a waiter in a local Irish pub. Within six months I was bartending. And that was it — I was smitten with the service industry. Over the years, I’ve tried unsuccessfully to branch into other fields — sales, marketing, property management — but none of them held the sway that bartending did. He who controls the liquor flow, I surmised, controls the world.

OK, so what if it took me seven years to get my bachelors degree once I decided to go back to school. A lot of people go to college for that long. (All together now: “They’re called doctors.”)

But I was able to pay for my entire college education with bar tips. That includes four years of community college and three years at Michigan State University. I did fall back on credit cards occasionally, but when I graduated in 2004 from MSU with a degree in journalism, I had no student debt, and I was able to pay off my credit card debt within two years. And I found the ultimate Plan B to whatever happens in life.

Bartending is a cataclysm-proof occupation. No matter what happens — World War IV, the technological singularity, a new ice age — people will always need to get together at the end of the day, loosen up their brains with a little social lubricant and say, “Boy howdy, am I glad that’s over!” Sometimes I wish I wasn’t good at it, or at least that I didn’t like it so much. On at least four separate occasions I’ve “retired” from bartending only to find myself scrambling for a job and coming back to it, like Michael Corleone in “The Godfather Part III”: “Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in.”

It has its advantages: Your earnings are all in cash, you meet a steady stream of new people, the earliest you ever have to be at work in the morning is 10:30 and you’re part of the front line in the latest community news and gossip.

This last part appeals to me particularly. When I tended bar in downtown Lansing, I was always finding out which business owner was buying which other person out, who was building what where and everyone’s dirty secrets. Which married man had hit on every last one of the waitresses. What type of alcohol that politician asked me to pour in his coffee mug to avoid being seen with a cocktail.

Of course, there are the obvious disadvantages: No health insurance, long hours, it’s physically exhausting, cleanup at the end of every shift is nasty and time-consuming, it’s essentially an entry-level job.

And that’s why I kept trying to get out of it. It’s one thing to be privy to a hot rumor; it’s another to know that the reason I have that information is because people were talking openly in front of me as though I was an idiot. If I’d had my reporter hat on, it would have been a different story.

So laugh if you will that journalism is a dying profession. Sure, I made more bartending 10 years ago than I do crafting (what I hope are) insightful, well-rounded stories that connect people with the arts and culture in their community. But dammit, journalism is a worthwhile cause. For me it´s the worthwhile cause. And until that asteroid hits, I’ll keep on cranking out my little stories and hoping for the best.

People always ask … Bartending is inherently a social occupation, requiring a certain amount of small talk that can get a little tedious. Note: Not all of these answers were actually spoken aloud.

Q: “How much do you make bartending?” A: “Enough to pay my rent but not enough to pay a mechanic to figure out why my ‘check engine’ light won’t go out. And you?”

Q: “Who won the game?” (especially when there are several games going on at once) A: “Although you can see that I have a large TV behind me, the reality of my job is that I have to keep my back to it so that I can attend to my guests. However, a bunch of people did scream ‘NOOOO!’ about half an hour ago, so I think not us.”

Q: (Concerning the oversized bottle of gin sitting at one of the bar): “Is this real?” A: “If you’re asking me if it’s made of matter and exists in the same plane of existence as you and I, then yes, it is very much real.”

Q: (When asked what they’d liked to drink) “I don’t know, what do you have?” A: “If you will look about you, you may notice this is a bar with a full complement of fine alcohol choices. The sheer number of combinations would make giving you an exhaustive list time-prohibitive. What do you say we start with what you know you like?”

Q: “It’s my birthday — can I get a free drink?” A: “No. Even if the law did not make it expressly forbidden to give away free alcohol, giving you a free drink would constitute theft and put my very job in jeopardy. Besides, I don’t know you.”

Q: (Indignantly) “How can you not carry (some new brand of vodka that just came out)?” A: “We’re not early adopters. But it’s good to see their marketing is working on you. P.S.: I know you think you can tell the difference, but you can’t.”

Q: “Did you go to school to be a bartender?” A: “No, I went to school to be a journalist, and yes, I am keeping notes. You will be part of a story I write some day about questions I am repeatedly asked.”