And Valentine's has passed...

Oh, the horror of working Valentine's Day in the food industry, especially the slightly rarefied version of such that I now inhabit. Most people class New Year's and Valentine's Day as similar in their amateur hour-ness and they are similar in the insanity of them and the way in which they are fairly hellish for service workers and the way restaurants are going to make you pay out the ying to enjoy them, but I wouldn't mind one day doing the big New Year's thing if I had the money to burn. It is a social holiday and many places expend lots of effort to make it fun for guests. Everyone eventually gets to toast the New Year.

Valentine's Day doesn't feel like that. There is no party and everything you might like about going out to eat at a nice restaurant is muted. There is no personal attention and the food, no matter how much you try, is going to be pumped out to some degree. Worst of all, you know the staff of the restaurant is dealing with people who are difficult, to say the least. I have, mostly, had good Valentine's Days in the industry, but the day brings out the worst in people. All this pressure to go be crammed like sardines. The best part of my Valentine's Day was having a quiet drink with my best friend at a lousy bar and staying up in bed reading a zombie book.

I know there are competing narratives on a day that is so built up. It is hard to shake this feeling that you have to do something and it has to be perfect, but isn't that drive for perfection almost the exact opposite of the type of empathy and compromise that is required in relationships. It is all outward directed, you have to get X and you have to go to a nice place and blah blah blah. I just want to drive home the night before Valentine's Day singing songs at the top of my lungs with someone else who knows all the words.