Secret Santa

By the first week of October, jack o’lanterns were already decorating the entrance of The Brown Jug café, along with cardboard witches and billowy white ghosts with large, round charcoal eyes. The owners, Solon and Nikos were Greek immigrant brothers who’d always been eager to demonstrate their support for American holidays. In another month, it’d be Thanksgiving when the chefs would prepare roast turkey, mashed potatoes with gravy, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie. Fresh-cut chrysanthemums would emit a welcoming aroma to the Jug’s loyal customers, too far away to go home for America’s favorite holiday.

And four weeks later, Christmas! Glorious Christmas when the brothers decorated their restaurant with hundreds of miniature green pine trees and tiny golden lights. An electric train moved on small tracks, tooting its horn – whoo whoo - with soft magical sounds under glittery silver stars, suspended from the ceiling. Mistletoe would hang in the doorway with bright red poinsettias on the tabletops.

The Brown Jug was the most popular restaurant in Ann Arbor, a fast-food oasis, offering community to the university’s athletes, students, and faculty; the place to go when alumni parents were in town. It never employed waiters, only waitresses, coordinating their shifts with classes and exams. University graduates who’d waitressed for a year earned membership into The Juggers, a waitress sorority that awarded its members one free pizza a month … forever.

Irma Lee Jones was one Brown Jug waitress who’d never be a Jugger. Middle-aged and overweight, she was a single mother who’d barely finished high school. She’d worked at the restaurant since she was a teenager and righteously claimed the Big Tables as her exclusive turf. These extra-long tables accommodated large groups, and large groups left large tips that Irma depended on to pay her rent and feed her kids.

Irma’s predictable life, however, was about to change. A new waitress had arrived who threatened her already precarious existence. On a brief university exchange program, Inger from Denmark was academically gifted with no experience serving restaurant food. Her first day of work happened to fall on Irma’s day off when the brothers assigned her to Irma’s Big Tables. Methodical and scientific by temperament, Inger carefully studied the layout and then created a strategy.

First, she memorized what orders went with which customers so she could place their food directly in front of them and not someone else. People notice this small gesture, evidently, and love the attention it implies. Second, Inger learned that by flirting with the chefs, she could get her orders fulfilled faster. Thirdly, as soon as the food was eaten, she removed the used plates. “How about a cup of coffee?” she’d ask. “Another beer?” Such subtle psychological maneuvers made customers happy and happy customers left big tips.

Believing that Inger’s waitressing style was good for them, the brothers gave the Big Tables to her and moved Irma who begged them, unsuccessfully, to change their minds. Oblivious to Irma’s discontent, Inger watched with wonder how her three-pronged formula raked in the cash. On some occasions, she went home with over $100 in her pocket, an extraordinary amount in 1965 when the minimal wage was $1.25 an hour.

Irma grew more anxious by the day. When Solon and Nikos installed the electric train, the strain of imminent Christmas became too much for her.

“How does it feel to take money from me?” Irma asked Inger, barely concealing her humiliation.

“Are you accusing me of stealing?” Inger asked.

“You college girls! You aren’t supporting nobody but yourselves.”

Inger watched Irma massage her feet. As the older woman removed insignificant amounts of change from her tip cup, something spoke to Inger’s conscience. Feeling the weight of shame, she realized that to her waitressing was a game, but to this mother of three, it was a means of survival.

As it was, this practice of tipping food servers was new to Inger because it wasn’t done in Denmark. Protected by unions, Danish waiters and waitresses got decent salaries and never had to rely on tips to supplement their wages.

“I’m sorry,” Inger said. “I really am. Do you want The Big Tables? You can have them back.”

“It don’ matter,” Irma replied. “I’m too old to compete with you. All I know is that Christmas is right around the corner, and I won’t have nothin’ to give my kids.”

The next night was a victory party for the university’s football team. When Inger’s tips reached close to $100, she gathered fistfuls of quarters and furtively dropped them into Irma’s tip cup. The next night, she did it again, and then again and again, night after night, covertly subsidizing Irma’s tips. Did Irma ever wonder about this? If so, she never said a word, and if any of the others suspected that she had a secret Santa, they kept it to themselves.

Just before the 25th, Irma went shopping. She bought toys her children had long wished for but never expected, including a bicycle for her oldest son. Irma also bought a potted plant, one that blooms only in December which she wrapped in cellophane and gave to Inger.

“Thank you,” Irma said. “This is a Christmas I’ll never forget.”

Feeling homesick, Inger booked a flight to Copenhagen. She wanted to be there on Christmas Eve when Danes held hands and circled a tree decorated with burning candles while singing carols. This tradition was something she refused to miss, so twelve hours later, she was in her parents’ home. She told them about all the people she’d met: the Greek brothers who wanted to please everybody; the athletes and their coaches who protected the university’s reputation; the smart students; and Irma, dear Irma, who would never earn what she was worth.

Inger raised a glass of wine. “Skål, Irma!” she shouted. “Skål Brown Jug! Skål and Glædelig Jul!”