Tired: Or I'm a whiny teacup

Once again I'm tired. It seems as if this is a perpetual state. Everyone is tired. I don't think there is anyother way to be in the restaurant industry. If you get enough sleep then you aren't working hard enough. It's a strange world to live in. It's nice when someone else validates it. "Thank God it's not just me". I get worried that I can't hack it. That if I'm this tired what will it be like when I have my own place. It's easy to assume that those who are successful have it easy. In reality they are just as beat as the rest of us. There are no breaks, no lunches, no weekends, no vacations. It seems I write mostly about how hard this business is. In part it's venting. But mostly it's a necessary rationalization. I should be tired. This is a hard business. I do work alot. It's easy to forget about when you are surrounded by those who do the same thing. You assume that since you are feeling the effects that you are somehow not as capable, or doing something wrong, or not cut out for it. There is a necessary understanding that it's just the way it is. If you want to succeed, you're just going to be tired (of course this applies to any pursuit). Cooking on the line is most likely the most stressful job, where someones life isn't immediately on the line (of course someones livelihood is). During service you are pummeled with orders for hours. During that time you are forced to focus on several components, all of which have different cooking times, and techniques. All of these things have to come up together just to put out one plate, and that plate must be perfect. Perfect, like the one before it and the one after it. You do that hundreds of times a night. When it's all over, you clean up, take stock of what's been used and get ready to do it all over the next day. The exhileration of sevice lingers for hours. Slowly the adrenaline, caffeine and nicotine that has kept you going for the last eight, ten, twelve hours, begins to fade. The next day you wake up and head to the shop to find the same sense of urgency that go you rolling the day before. Over time you become uncomfortable having only one or two things to do. Days off become midless shutdown days. 'What the hell am I supposed to do outside the kitchen?' 'Shouldn't I be working?'. It's really bad when you wish you were working and it's your day off. You understand the necessity of not working. One must take time off or one becomes a little batty, a little scattered, and a littel pissy. Yet on that day off you just can't get comfortable. Where's the rhythm? Wheres's the commotion? Where's the adrenaline? Where's my damn prep list?!