Oh, What a Night in the Restroom

The dark-haired young woman smudges her eyeliner, blots her cherry-red lipstick and works a few strands of disobedient hair into place. She sees me but ignores me as I stare at her staring at herself intently in the mirror.

I’m working as the bathroom attendant at Denim & Diamonds in Santa Monica--a country-Western dance club--lording over a counter full of grooming products. Bathroom attendants make a lot of people uncomfortable. I can tell this woman doesn’t like me being there; she does her best not to make eye contact and seems to be in a hurry to leave.

I can’t blame her. I’ve felt weird around attendants. If someone hands me a towel, am I supposed to tip her? If I use hair spray do I have to tip? What if I want to leave a tip but don’t have change? Will I have bad tip karma?

I have never envied bathroom attendants their job, nor have I pitied them. I just never really got why they were there.

Now, having been one, I understand more. The view is very different from here.

Tuesday night is Ladies’ Night at Denim & Diamonds, and by 8 the dance floor is packed with urban cowboys and gals learning a line dance.

The bathroom is similarly crowded as a steady stream of women swing open the heavy wooden door for a few minutes of refuge.

Jammie Young is here for a couple of hours to give me a crash course on bathroom attending before she leaves me on my own. She usually works at Denim & Diamonds in Woodland Hills but is filling in for the regular attendant here, who is ill.

She shows me how to replace the toilet paper and seat covers, pointing out the extra supplies, and reminds me to check the stalls occasionally.

Then she arranges supplies on the counter: five kinds of hair spray, spray deodorant, several bottles of nail polish, a plastic tub filled with combs and brushes, a mirror, various kinds of makeup, mouthwash, dental floss, cigarettes, matches, a dish filled with mints and gum, eyedrops, hand lotion, a tray of colognes (Ysatis, Eternity, Oscar de la Renta, Obsession), cotton balls, a blow dryer and a vase of fabric flowers.

She greets guests with a chipper “hello.” Some say hello back, others don’t; some make small talk and others ask her where the regular attendant is.

One young woman asks why there are two of us.

“She’s training me,” I say.

“She’s training you?” the woman replies, eyebrow raised, lip turned in a slight sneer, obviously thinking that a ferret could do this job.

When Young leaves, the bathroom becomes my domain. I smile, greet the customers, and get a mixture of responses.

Most don’t acknowledge me at all. Some hesitantly ask if I am waiting for a stall, even though I am sitting on a stool and wearing the typical service job outfit: black pants and a white blouse.

Occasionally, a woman uses hair spray or other products and leaves without tipping. Some casually drop a dollar or change into the tip tray; others make sure I’m aware of their generosity as they carefully put a dollar down, turn around and say, “There you go ! Thanks a lot!”

I smile and thank them.

They touch up their lipstick, dry their sweat-soaked hair and scrutinize themselves in the mirror. The hair flip is big here: head swings down, hair is tossed at the roots, head swings back, hair is arranged. It’s a wonder they don’t all get whiplash. Some are in 10, 12 times during the night, smoking, laughing, gossiping.

The women chatter freely in front of me, mostly about men, occasionally about work.

“If one man is good, five is better,” a 30-ish woman in a chambray shirt and vest says to her friend.

“Well how many am I supposed to go out with?” the friend asks.

An older woman in a cowboy hat parks herself next to me, back against the wall, and stands there for a while.

“I’m hiding from someone,” she says. “He’s very drunk and he’s been hitting on me.”

The hours crawl by, and through the door I hear talk and laughter and songs about lovin’ and cheatin’ and lyin’ and whiskey. The longer I am there, the more the customers talk to me. A nice young woman in her early 30s is back for her fourth time; she confides that she’s going to Saudi Arabia in a month to be a flight attendant.

“My girlfriends said, ‘We’ve got 30 days, so we’re gonna have fun !’ ” she announces in a Texas drawl. “I have a one-year contract on this job.” She pauses, looks at me in the mirror and says in an almost-whisper, “To tell you the truth, I’m really scared. I know it’ll be good, but I’m scared. Besides, that’s not really where I want to be right now. Where I want to be is in the cockpit .”

I encourage her, telling her that everything will work out. She nods in agreement, wishes me well, and takes off.

Late in the evening a girl comes in and spends a lot of time in a stall. It sounds like she’s throwing up. When she emerges I ask if she’s OK, and she seems grateful that someone cares.

At 1:45 a.m. I start to pack up. In the six hours I’ve been there I’ve wiped the sinks countless times, taken beer bottles out of the stalls, checked toilet paper supplies and told a woman she had her dress hiked up in her pantyhose. I’ve made $13 in tips. I reek of smoke, feel very claustrophobic, and I am exhausted.

I’ve come to Denim & Diamonds via Stan’s Quick Grooming Agency in Culver City, which since 1988 has placed male and female bathroom attendants in such places as the Hollywood Athletic Club, Roxbury and Jewell’s Catch One. Stan Harrell is the company president.

Harrell stresses that bathroom attendants not only “pamper” guests but also cut down on drug use and provide some security. They work on a contract basis, must furnish their own supplies and work for tips only.

Since I made a whopping $13 for six hours work (which I gave back to Young), I ask Harrell how this can possibly be cost-effective.

“It’s not so much the service,” he says, “it’s how you make people feel. A guy comes in wearing an expensive suit and tie and he stands in front of the mirror and combs his hair, and it just has to be perfect. So what does he want? He wants to hear that he’s perfect. So I compliment him. ‘Hey, man, where’d you get that suit from? That tie just knocks it out, dude! Some woman’s going to be in trouble tonight!’

“When you give that to somebody and they look at you, and they see you, with that comes the money.”

Harrell has worked at almost every job in the restaurant business: waiter, maitre d’, busboy, restroom attendant.

“There were those who thought I had hit rock bottom being in the restroom,” he confides. But rather than sit and fume, Harrell found this attitude amusing. “In order to do this job you have to be well-read and be able to talk on any topic. When I waited tables, my main thing was to do it with dignity. If I didn’t receive dignity, as long as I knew I had it, it didn’t matter.”

I know what he means.