A typescript discovered years later in our aunt’s library collection in our family home in Włochy near Warsaw: Eugenia Maternicka (1875-1967), head of the secretariat and accounting department at the pre-war Gebethner i Wolff Publishing House, Warsaw.

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(attempted transliteration)

Written by Chrzanowski.

                        Modern waiter.

…………………………..

I’m back in the pub. Here at the “Pod Dziewchłym Medorem” bar. You
have no idea how terribly I lived this year, unemployed
as a waiter. I did nothing but polish the pavements of Warsaw, and my heart broke
watching these socialites pretending to be waiters and insulting
the culinary profession. Of course – every dish demands respect
and spiritual understanding, and yet they serve vodka warm, soup cold, and
fruit scissors with fish. As for these actresses, or artistic waitresses
, these are true artists already at such a patinated age, if only
because of their life experience – some of them don’t exactly screw up the
parish, but these so-called “krowieta,” or “artistic scoundrels,” are the ones who
play their part in the nation – one of them on stage carried a tray at most and said
four words: “Soup on the table – the carriage has arrived” – and she was wrong,
because sometimes she said: “The carriage has arrived – the soup has arrived.” When a
guest orders a de voleja with peas, she’s such an important woman, striding to the kitchen
like Balladyna to a coronation. If you happen to come across a guest who orders half a black
dress barefoot, without a cake, she smiles painfully, like the Lady of the Camellias
before her death. You have no idea what I lived through that year.
I know that in such a turmoil, one person is as important as a sardine
in an ocean storm, but that sardine only cares about its head. Truth
be told, I’ve been working in my profession for 30 years, and I’ve never seen a
sardine’s head. What was I supposed to do? Throughout November and December of last
year, I was transporting vodka from Lublin, but it’s such a greedy commodity that
I kept running low and had to move on to something else. I was making
soap, and my brother-in-law, Pikutowski, was making halva. Business was actually going well, but
one day we got completely wasted and our raw materials got mixed up.
So I had to stop producing, and my brother-in-law, Pikutowski, was already
making halva from this material. Later, consumers complained that when
they ate their fill of halva, they blew soap bubbles, but somehow he managed to break
even. And I returned to my beloved profession. And it went like this: my brother-in-law,
Pikutowski, said: “They’re opening a new bar, ‘Pod Medorem,’ go, maybe you
‘ll get a job.” I arrived, and the place looked like it was being finished,
plaster was falling from the ceiling, as per regulations. In the middle of this mess,
a woman stood, and immediately asked: “Sir, what’s your business?”

“Regarding the job.” She looked me over from the soles of my shoes to the spotlight through her lantern
and said, “Regarding what job?” “I was just going to serve you as a waiter
.” When she heard this, she started smiling, shook my hand, and said,
“And what theater did you perform at?” I was stunned, and she
continued, “Because only artists and socialites will serve you here
.” I wanted to punch the woman in the gut, and I said, “You’re asking
who I am? I’m the idol of women—Moris Chevalier.” When she heard this,
she almost drooled with joy and said, “Although I don’t
go to the movies because when you sign, my eyes dart, but I’ve heard
that you’re full of perversions.” She immediately signed me a seven-year contract.
I’m now the head of reception. I invite you to dinner at our
bar, and in case anyone would like to send their mother-in-law to the afterlife, I recommend
our signature salad “A la Chevalier”.

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Thank you for your help in explaining the author, greetings to all visitors of the website Narodowa.pl,

Anna and Maria née Mioduszewski

Warsaw-Włochy, entry on the website Narodowa.pl on January 1, 1999.