I was with my wife and her whole family, at Shilohs, a famous restaurant in San Antonio that has been owned and operated by the same family for generations. [0]

We were placing our orders with the waitress, and two things stuck out to me:

1. She appeared to be twelve years old.

2. She wasn’t writing anything down. She was relying on her memory to make sure she got everything correct.

It took me a long time to realize that she was probably more like eighteen, and another member of the family who had at least been on-site and involved in some way with the restaurant in the same way that I grew up helping my dad at his scene shop at the university theater where he was the Technical Director.

That’s when I realized I was old.

And yes, the order came back perfect. She didn’t miss a single thing.

[0] I think it has since been sold, but at the time I think they were over 100 years owned and operated by the same german-heritage family.