Everyone should have to work retail or wait tables at some point in their lives. I’ve done both.

Every shift was chock-full of lessons in how to treat others, how you want to be treated, how to handle a pride-swallowing situation while keeping your dignity and your job. Restaurant work also teaches that people are super weird about their food.

My senior year in high school, I worked as a hostess in a restaurant that was part of a huge national chain. After graduation, I went to a state university that was an easy 45-minute drive from home. Once I got a taste of college life without a job, I called my manager and asked him to hire me as a server. When you’re a broke college student, a job in which you walk away with cash in hand at the end of the shift does not suck.

My freshman year in college was a disaster. I went back home after spring semester and enrolled in community college to pull myself (and my GPA) together. I continued to work as a server.

I was sort of really good at being a server. I was great at the people side. I genuinely loved the interaction with the customers, unless they were assholes*. I was not stellar at the organizational side of waiting tables (yes, I know, this is a real revelation for those of you who have been following along). Serving requires being able to triage and remember a rapidly-changing variety of requests and tasks. I was frequently “in the weeds” (overwhelmed) and I was regularly admonished for spending too much time in the front of the house while relying too heavily on food expediters and runners to bring my food out from the kitchen. In that regard, I was not a great co-worker. I was good to my colleagues in other ways, though. For example, I was an easy target for people who needed someone to pick up a shift or stay late.

In most restaurants, the staff is sent home toward the end of a shift on a rolling basis depending on how busy the restaurant is or is expected to get. We had one manager who lived in mortal fear of an “after-movie rush” that, to the best of my knowledge, never once materialized. We stood around, cooling our heels at $2.13** an hour with no tips, inwardly seething. When a server was “cut” (their station of assigned tables is closed for the shift), they did their “backwork” (a list of housekeeping tasks), checked out with the manager on duty, tipped out other staff members as appropriate, and beat it the hell out of there.

One night, I was doing my backwork when two middle-aged men came in shortly before closing. The server who had the closing station was not happy to see them. There is an ongoing point of contention between restaurant workers and the dining public. If you ask anyone who has ever worked in a restaurant, they will tell you it’s a jerk move to walk in less than 15 minutes before closing time. Most patrons will point to the sign on the door that posts the restaurant’s hours of operations. Both sides are right.

My co-worker, who was eager to get home because she had small children, asked me if I would trade into the closing station. I didn’t mind picking up the table, and greeted the men cheerfully. They ordered double fajitas to split, and a couple of non-alcoholic beverages. I knew it wasn’t going to be a big tip, but they were nice and it was no big deal. They were my only customers, and I’m chatty by nature, so it didn’t bother me when one of the men struck up a friendly conversation. He asked about my studies and my life. I’ve always had solid creeper radar, and I didn’t get that vibe from him at all. His questions were direct and unusually specific, but benign.

When they finished eating, I dropped their check for $28 and some change. The man with the questions handed me a $100 bill. I turned to go get his change and he stopped me. He said he wanted me to keep all the change. I distinctly remember saying I couldn’t do that, it was too much. It would still be a big tip now, but this was twenty years ago and it was huge. We were in Overland Park, Kansas, not Vegas. Tips like that just didn’t really happen. With sincerity and certainty in his voice, he told me he wanted me to have it. He encouraged me to keep going. It was a broad statement, imbued with meaning. He wanted me to keep going with school. Keep going with work. Keep going with life.

I was in a difficult place. I was ashamed by my ignominious return home from college. Things were rocky at home, as they are apt to be when everyone in the house has struggles of their own and you’re supposed to be off doing the college girl thing. I was getting my first taste of what it’s like not to have enough money. I was starting to gain weight. I was depressed but didn’t know it. It felt like my world was spinning out of control, and I was spinning right along with it. I had totally lost my bearings.

I don’t even remember what I used the money for. But I remember how I felt in that moment, and I’ve carried that with me all these years.

It didn’t take me long to understand the man had an inkling of what he wanted to do early in the meal, and asked me all those questions to confirm his instincts about me. I don’t even mind that he was, in effect, judging whether I was worthy of the gesture. That $71 and some change meant so much more than the monetary amount at the time, and it still does. At one of my lowest points, a stranger reminded me of my value. Sometimes, when I feel the world start to spin out of control, I remember that night and am reassured that all I have to do is keep going. One foot in front of the other.

I have no idea who that man was. To the best of my knowledge, our paths never crossed again. He’s always with me, though.

Good things happen when you are generous of spirit. Sometimes the rewards are obvious, like you help out a co-worker who just wants to get home to her kids and half an hour later someone hands you a 70+ percent tip. It’s rarely so clear, but we shouldn’t let that stop us. As often as I can, I try to be to others who that man was to me. Gestures small and large. Some monetary, some not. Every time I do it, I hope it says keep going.

* Assholes go out to eat a lot. Another time, I’ll tell you about the God Squad, the HUPs, and other colorful characters I encountered in my days as a server. However, I will take this opportunity to share just one example, over which I still do a slow burn lo these many years later: A man and a woman came in early every Friday evening and requested the same table. They ordered a carafe of house Chablis and little else. They sat for hours, taking up a valuable four-person booth on a busy Friday night, costing the server several more parties’ worth of tips. When they were finally ready to leave, they stood up and each put down one dollar. A single dollar. That’s not even the worst part. Like clockwork, the woman waited for the man to turn and walk out. The second his back was to her, the woman slid the dollar back into her purse. Every time. Assholes.

**In twenty years, this has not changed. The minimum wage for tipped employees is still $2.13 per hour.