I just got a job bartending. This is funny for two reasons:

1) I don't know how to bartend...
2) ...

OK, so it's only funny for one reason. And maybe it's not that funny. Especially when four people want a shot of something like, say, 'A Red-Headed Slut' and you look at them like they just asked you to pee in a cup. My patient manager has been schooling me on the basics and is right there to answer any questions and knows I'll pick it up. But I'm finding that I'm learning and I have to learn quickly. People want their booze and they want it right and they want it now and they have no time to watch you try to figure out which button on the soda gun is tonic and which is Sprite. Learning quickly has become my life lately-- picking up on something faster than I may have had to in the past has become my full time job.

It's funny being on your own after four years of not being on your own-- it's another skill you have to learn quick to do. See, there's this padding that gets thicker and thicker the more you stay with someone that cushions any sort of blow. Business is slow for a month, well he's there... so that's OK. You left your keys in a friend's car... that's OK because he is home and you don't need them. Your friends all have dates or are working on a Saturday night... it's cool because he's going to be your Saturday night fun. Those things aren't there anymore. You are completely on your own and you have to figure out how that's going to work. You have to test yourself and it's risky. Hurt. Rejection. Frustration.

A loud dance song pops through the bar as a guy sits down asking me for a Apple martini. The manager that trains me is pouring four drinks of his own and has only taught me this drink once. Looking at the rows and rows of bottles that I have to chose from I decide that instead of waiting for someone to hold my hand and walk me through I'm going to give the drink a whirl. The worse that happens? I have to buy him a drink out of tips and apologize for my lack of good-drink-making skills.

So I reach for the vodka and the apple pucker and the triple sec lined against the wall behind me. The dark lighting hides my deer-caught-in-a-head-light look and the biting of my lip. I keep glancing out of the corner of my eye to see what the guy is doing while I shake the martini. I'm nervous. I hate flopping. Failing. Looking like an idiot... especially when there is no one there to blame, but me.

"So, yeah, my second night here..." I say to the hat wearing guy as I pour the chilled drink in a glass. He nods and smiles. I'm trying to warm him up.

I put the glass on the coaster and wipe my hands on my jeans and smile while saying the amount he owes.

"It's perfect." The guys says to me as he pulls his bills out of the wallet. "For your second day, you are pretty confident... you look like you belong back there!"

As I set down his change, smile and thank him I let my nervous stomach settle. Like learning a new drink at the bar I'm going to have to start winging it a little more in life. Sure I'm going to mix the wrong drink once in a while, but in the mean time I'm going to meet some awesome people who are going to be hanging on the other side of the bar. I'm going to pick up a skill I never thought I could be good at. I'm going to eventually have to learn what a Red-Headed Slut is and be good with it. But that's part of all this... you have to learn so you can be better... a better bartender and a better single person.