The Drive Home…
The music stays off.
That's the part people outside this industry never get. After a twelve-hour shift, the last thing I want is more noise. I'd get in the car after a busy Saturday and just drive, windows down, nothing playing in the background, because the buzz of service doesn't stop when the shift does. It has to come down on its own, and that takes about as long as the drive.
I-295 through Portland at midnight is a different road than the one I took to get in. At two in the afternoon it's stop and start the whole way. At midnight it's empty. Everyone else is home watching their show or already asleep, and my night is only just starting to unwind.
So I drive, and I go back through it. What went right. What didn't. What could have been better. The things that clicked, and why.
Then I realize I haven’t eaten for hours and hunger finally kicks in.
Here's what nobody believes. Chefs don't eat well after service. People assume we go home and cook, because we know how. We've got the skills, the knowledge, the hands. We must eat like kings and queens.
That couldn’t be further from the truth - we eat like students. McDonald's on the way home. Taco Bell if it's still open. A bowl of cereal, standing at the counter, half one in the morning.
Every cook understands why. The last thing we want off the clock is to act like we're still on it. I've been feeding people for twelve hours. I'm not doing it again for myself. I want something I don't have to think about, that turns up already made, that lets me sit down. It isn't a meal I'm after. It's comfort.
The feet go first. I never noticed them during service, but the second I sat down, they let me know. Fifteen thousand steps without leaving the building. Then the rest of it turns up at once. The burn on my forearm from the oven door. The little splatter marks off the oil. The cut on my finger that'll sting for days every time it meets salt or a lemon. Small things. Things the guests never see.
The shower isn't about being clean. It's about getting the onion and garlic off my hands, which never works. That smell is baked in. It'll still be there tomorrow. Chef gear and aprons in the wash. Then an episode of The Office I've already seen fifteen times, or twenty minutes scrolling nothing at all, just to feel like a normal person for a bit before going in and doing it again tomorrow.
Or today, depending on what time I got in.
And then I lie there, and it starts… Did the order go through? I've talked to a supplier's answering machine at one in the morning more times than I can count, leaving a message after the beep, hoping somebody picks it up early enough for it to make the truck. Did everything get turned off? Are we covered tomorrow, and if we're not, how long is mise going to take with one less pair of hands? How many covers are we looking at?
You're not working. You're just not finished.
Then there are the other drives.
Same road, same hour, same wrecked feet, completely different car ride. Word comes back from the floor. Compliments to the kitchen. The guest said the special was incredible. A packed service where nothing broke and nothing had to come off the board.
The best ones aren't even about the food. The best ones are when the whole building clicks. Back of house and front of house, nobody bickering, nobody dragging, everyone on their A game at the same time. That doesn't happen often and you can't schedule it. When it does, I replay that the whole way home and I'm almost disappointed when I pull in.
That's the one that keeps us here. It's why the cook who swore last night he was done with this industry is back on the line today.
The drive is the same drive now. The road hasn't changed. The body has. Those long hours land harder at this end of a career than they did at twenty-two. The body keeps the score, and it settles up eventually. Behind the line is a young man's game, or so they say.
The garlic's still on your fingers when the alarm goes.
You go in anyway.
