One waitress was left in tears after an elderly widow left a bittersweet personal note with her tip.
When Megan King arrived for her weekend shift as a waitress, she was unaware that an elderly woman was about to leave her in tears. It just goes to show that, when we do our jobs the best way we can, we may touch someone who desperately needs a human connection.
According to Newsweek, “Megan King shared two special photos with her Twitter followers in a now-viral tweet with more than 600,000 likes. The first is a picture of a handwritten note she’d received with her tip. The second is a picture of her reaction to the note, which shows King smiling and in tears.”
The note read, “Thank you very much for your kind service. This was my first time eating out alone since my husband passed. I was hoping I could get through it.” King’s tweet, sharing the note, simply said, “in pain.” The waitress spoke to Newsweek and gave her account of what transpired. “She [the customer who left the note] came in about halfway through my 17-hour shift, and it was on Sunday, which is always pretty busy,” King explained.
“About halfway through her meal, it started to slow down so we chatted for a few minutes. Small talk, nothing too deep. She told me she was almost 70 and has been slowing down a bit. She said she just wanted to stop by an old favorite for a bite,” King said. The young waitress also recalled that the woman looked “a bit sad” as she ate and looked at King frequently throughout her meal.
“In retrospect, I wish I would’ve taken her quiet as an invitation. I think that’s what she wanted, looking back,” said King. “She kept looking up at me so I assumed something wasn’t right with her meal or that she needed something,” she added. “I guess she did, in a way. [She needed] an ear.”
Although in hindsight King wishes she would have spent more time with the grieving widow, the note serves as proof that her attentiveness made a huge impact. And, in turn, the elderly woman made an impact on King as well. “I was very surprised,” shared King. “As soon as I read that she’d lost her husband, I lost it.”
“I had to use the restroom to get myself together enough to tend to my other tables even though I really didn’t have time to take a rest,” King continued. The waitress’s online followers were also touched by the widow’s note. “[T]hat’s super sad, but also sweet at the same time,” replied one commenter. “I just wanna give whoever wrote this note a hug. (I really don’t wanna admit this made me cry).”
However, others used King’s social media post as an excuse to start online trouble. Many were quick to jump to conclusions about the size of the tip, which, in the picture, appears to be rather small. “Are you crying because of that 1 dollar tip or the note because I would be crying because of the first one,” said a commenter.
King was quick to jump to the widow’s defense. She responded by explaining that the woman’s meal cost $11 and she left a $3 tip. She also added, “Not everyone can afford to tip well.” When someone took issue with that statement, King again defended the woman. “Old people who live on fixed income deserve to get out for a nice meal,” the waitress declared. “Big tippers make up for it anyway. I’m serving them. You aren’t. I’m standing by that, thanks,” she said, shutting down the criticism.
“A lot of our customers are older and living on fixed incomes, so they tip what they can,” King told Newsweek. “They are always welcome, no matter how much or little they tip.” And when it comes to the widow who left the kind note, King stated that her tip was “more than enough,” but she wouldn’t have cared if it had been smaller because “she was sweet and easy to take care of.”
