I think we can all learn something from Nanette

I’m going to be completely honest with you all: I had absolutely no idea what I was going to blog about for this week. And it’s not like I had a lot going on this week, so I had the time to come up with ideas. It was almost as if every idea I had in the past six weeks grew legs and walked out of my brain. But, after purchasing a net and attempting to catch every single one of them, I settled on the idea I have brought forth to you today.

I’m almost scared to ask. What on Earth did you come up with, then? Well, let me ask you all a question: who’s Nanette? Yeah, you heard me. Nanette, the title of the show, the supposed main story of the whole comedy special—Hannah Gadsby talked briefly about meeting her in a café (1:09-1:50) in Hannah Gadsby: Nanette. She was going to explain who Nanette was in greater detail, but then she moved to her next point of why she doesn’t like small towns. So who is she?

It’s a good thing I know how to use the Internet; otherwise, this would have been much more difficult.

Apparently, Gadsby explained to Variety that Nanette was a barista that worked at a café she visited once. “She was just an older lady who I would normally love to talk to, but because of what I represented, we didn’t,” she explained. While she admitted that she might have been wrong about her and merely projected what she thought was true, the occurrence was still significant enough for her to name the show after her. In the Netflix special there was no explanation of her, but in the live taping of the show, she explains who she is in greater detail (Aubrey).

Elana, how are you going to squeeze more out of this topic? You found out who Nanette was-now what? Are you going to search for every barista named Nanette in Australia until you find the exact same one that made Hannah feel terrible about herself? Are you going to out her to the public? Wait, is this about revenge? I’m so proud of you for going dark-side! I didn’t realize you had it in you! I’m glad you asked, voice in my head that severely doubts my ability to come up with conversation topics (also, tad bit violent there. Are you good?)! I actually want to talk about customer service.

What? Oh geez…

For those of you who aren’t aware, when I go back to Morgantown for long breaks, I work at a Panera as a line worker. This means I make the sandwiches and salads, serve the soups and pastas, and give extra cutlery and napkins even when I made sure the customer had them. As easy as this probably sounds, it’s not. Plenty of you reading this probably understand that food service jobs are stressful and exhausting: running around, standing on your feet, almost cutting your hands when you’re cutting things, almost burning yourself because you’re paying more attention to the order than your hands—it’s all part of the job. Even if you don’t work in food service, any type of job that requires pleasing the customer to the point that they will want to come back again is tiring and it can be draining.

But here’s the tricky part: you can’t let any customers see how tired and achey you are. No matter where you are in the café, you have to treat every customer with respect. So while I understand Nanette’s behavior was not appropriate for her job, we’ve all been there. You’ve been working several hours without a break, you haven’t had food since the day before, and you barely get any sleep; interactions with other human beings is a nightmare. You barely have control over yourself, but you have to be nice to people in order to keep your job. That isn’t to say Nanette wasn’t out of line-she definitely was. I’m just trying to see this encounter from both sides. Sure, Hannah must’ve felt pretty bad because the barista looked at her like she was a freak, and based on her identity, the feeling was probably much worse, but Nanette honestly probably thought, “Oh no, another order? I just need five minutes to sit and breathe! Why the hell did she even order anything?”

If there is one thing this audience should learn from this, it’s this: don’t assume anything. Hannah assumed the barista hated her because of who she was, but she admitted she could be wrong. Nanette might not actually hate lesbians—she might just hate her job…and people in general.

Works Cited

Aubrey, Sophie. “How a Scathing, Silent Cafe Interaction Inspired the Name of Hannah Gadsby's 'Nanette'.” Mamamia, Mamamia, 20 July 2018, www.mamamia.com.au/why-is-nanette-called-nanette/.