Anxious Masculinity Watch


Man, do I hate my job. That's why, tomorrow, I'm going everywhere with my resume.

I used to like it, but, it also used to not suck.

So anyway, on with the AMW.

Sunday night I picked up a hostessing shift for someone. I was all excited that my brand new high-waisted pants (I like to call them my Katherine Hepburn pants) fit me, which means I've lost some weight. Anyway, I wore those with a button-down shirt, which I buttoned almost all the way to the top, exposing nothing more than a little neck. I'm not there 5 minutes before one of the kitchen managers comes out and says, "Frankie, what's up? Trying to show off your boobs?"

Yes. In my outfit that exposes nothing more than neck and face, I'm trying to show off my boobs. The shirt isn't even tight, it's loose and kinda baggy. I felt pretty shitty and humiliated, and I shouldn't have, because I wasn't behaving like a fucking pig, HE was. But he not only said it to me, which is bad enough, but also in front of coworkers, and I thought it was pretty fucking shitty. I don't think I deserve humiliation or punishment for possessing breasts.

Later, I was standing in the pass-through (a section blocked away from customers), eating a cup of soup, and the same manager was laughing and looking at me with the other kitchen manager, also a fucking pig, and I wanted to fucking kill them. I said, "Gosh, why don't you get a fucking playboy? That way you'll actually get to SEE something." But I realized that a Playboy wouldn't give them the satisfaction of embarrassing and abusing someone like what they were doing to me does. Because I wasn't wearing a tight, lowcut shirt, or low-rise pants exposing a thong--I was completely covered up. The fun, I think, is in making a woman feel bad about herself.