Working With the Working WomanParker, Cornelia Stratton
History
Working With the Working Woman
Parker, Cornelia Stratton
United States -- Social conditions; Women -- Employment -- United States; Working class -- United States
To the left of my little doorway was a small, deep sink. Next to the
sink was a very large ice chest. On the side of the ice chest next
the sink hung the four soft-boiled-egg machines—those fascinating
contrivances in which one deposited the eggs, set the notch at two,
three, four minutes, according to the desires of the hurried guest
without, sank the cup-shaped container in the boiling water, and never
gave the matter another thought. At the allotted moment the eggs were
hoisted as if by magic from out their boilings. Verily are the wonders
of civilization manifold! The sink and the protruding ice chest filled
the entire left side of my small inclosure. Along the entire right and
front was a wide work-shelf. On this shelf at the right stood the
electric toasting machine which during busy hours had to be kept going
full blast.
“Toast for club!” a waiter sang out as he sped by, and zip! the
already partially toasted bread went into the electric oven to be done
so crisply and quickly that you could call out to that waiter, “Toast
for club” before he could come back and repeat his ominous, “Toast for
club!” at you. People who order club sandwiches seem always to be in a
special hurry.
In the front corner just next the toaster stood the tray of bread
sliced ready to toast, crusts off for dry or buttered toast, crusts on
for “club,” very thin slices for “toast Melba.” Directly in front, and
next the bread tray, came the tray filled with little piles of graham
and milk crackers, seven in a pile. What an amazing number of folk
order graham or milk crackers in a café! It seems unbelievable to one
who has always looked upon a place furnishing eatables outside a home
as a chance to order somewhat indigestible food prepared entirely
differently from what any home could accomplish. Yet I know it to be a
fact that people seat themselves at a table or a counter in a more or
less stylish café and order things like prunes or rhubarb and graham
or milk crackers, and perhaps top off, if they forget themselves so
far, with a shredded-wheat biscuit.
It is bad enough if a man feels called upon to act that way before 2
P.M. When he puts in an order for such after 6 in the evening—then
indeed it is a case for tears. I would get the blues wondering
whatever could ail adult humanity that it ordered shredded-wheat
biscuits after dark.
Just above the counter holding the bread and crackers was the counter
on which were placed the filled orders for the waiters to whisk away.
It was but a step from there to my ice box. The orders it was my
business to fill were for blackberries, blueberries, prunes, sliced
oranges, rhubarb, grapefruit, whole oranges, apples, sliced peaches
and bananas, muskmelons, and four kinds of cheese. These pretty well
filled the upper half of the ice chest, together with the finished
salads I kept ahead, say three of each, lettuce and tomato, hearts of
lettuce, plain lettuce, and sliced tomatoes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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