Five Basic Rules of Going Back to Restaurants

Remember to be grateful, everyone

This has been quite the couple of years for shaking your head and despairing about the human condition, but I’ll confess, this anecdote, from a story about a Cape Cod restaurant that shut down for a day for the mental health of their increasingly abused wait staff, made me wonder if our species maybe just isn’t salvageable.

Last week, [a restaurant owner] said, a group of diners took out their frustrations on his employees after having to wait 40 minutes for a table and even longer because of a computer problem. They asked for the food to be boxed up after it had been brought to the table and then dumped the contents of the entire to-go bag in front of the restaurant when they left, he said.

“That’s just about the worst behavior I’ve ever seen,” he said.

I know that we have all been boxed up for a year-plus, and the mental strain on all of us has been more than we’ve ever dealt with before, and I know none of us are really quite themselves … but I’m pretty sure doing that assures that you’re going to hell when you die. I’m not sure how you atone for that. I think that makes you too far gone.

I love going to restaurants. I am not a foodie — I have no sense of smell, which tends to dull the palate a bit — but…