When the first waitress called me 'my love,' I thought she must be British, but she wasn't.
I wondered I'd done to deserve this effusiveness. Thought it was probably a slip of the tongue -- perhaps she momentarily forgot who she was talking to, mistook me for a friend or relative.
But no. By the time I finished my dinner, she'd used the same phrase twice more, and thrown in a 'darling.' This was beginning to grate: I finished my coffee and left before she could do it again.
A week or so later, the same thing happened again at a different restaurant. Aha, I thought, this must be something they have added to the curriculum at server school.
Decided it couldn't be. After all, this is not France. Serving meals is not considered a profession worthy of training, though we may sometimes wish it was.
But if these waitresses had been products of superior training, they would have been working at an upscale place. They weren't.
I guess it's just a new meme, like the one that changed the common Canadian greeting "Hi," into the updated American style "Hey." Exactly how these things catch on, I'll never know. You just wake up one day, and they have.
As for these waitresses calling me sweet names, well -- it's all very well to be welcoming. But to call a customer you've never laid eyes on before "my love" or "my darling" as you fill the water glass sounds patently insincere.
In fact, I'd consider it a kindness if they'd restrict their expressions of affection to something a little more restrained.
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