Back when I was waiting tables, which seems like a lifetime ago at this point, I’d often hang out at bars, by myself for two reasons: 1) I got free meals at work and was too lazy to cook the rest myself, and 2) What is at one moment a quiet, thoughtful afternoon of solitude can become an afternoon filled with bemusing stories of camaraderie. 100% of the time if I’m dining alone I will take a seat at the bar instead of a table for one. It’s so much more entertaining. Which is part of the reason why this woman dining alone at Caiola’s was so fascinating to me. Her back to the room, facing the window, she almost mocked me and my need for togetherness.
I took Mandy out to Caoila’s for her birthday. She’d never been, and I decided I’d rather spend an evening enjoying outstanding food and drink rather than take a chance on a gift that she’d feign excitement over and consign a respectable 12 months later. We had an amazing time! The food was decadent and complex, but not so complex that I couldn’t understand the menu, if you get my drift.
It was a Wednesday night, and we were in the back room, through the kitchen. Being the sous chef that has to stand near that door must be the worst. There was a group of three respectable upper-middle-aged guys in the corner to my left, one had a Southern accent and I heard them talking about Marketing, television, and the Bangor Daily News. (Hmmm). Behind Mandy was a younger couple who left shortly after we arrived. Then a woman, about 62ish, waltzed in and sat at a two top against the wall diagonal from us, facing the window. The waitress only put down a single place setting, water glass and menu. Table for one.
I knew almost immediately that I wanted to be her. She had a black cardigan, a simple canary-red blouse underneath, with a mid-calf ivory colored a-line skirt that had, like, ribbing or piping instead of stripes throughout. It was a beautiful skirt- hip, yet age appropriate. Her ballet flats, undoubtedly leather, matched her blouse as though they came together. Perhaps they were in fact ordered from the J.Crew catalogue at the same time. Dark framed reading (?) glasses hung low on her face, probably Michael Kors or Kate Spade or some designer brand. My favorite part about her was the bag she carried. It was my dream bag. A caramel leather tote whose sides slouched in around the handles the same way my canvas bags do. It was my dream bag. I think if Diane from Cheers was a real person and lived to be 62, this woman is what she would be like.
Out of the bag she pulled a pristine hardcover book, and inevitably tuned out everyone except for the waitress, who was forced to break into her line of vision when she brought yet another Grey Goose martini with a twist. Or maybe this woman opted into the Buy Local movement and ordered a Cold River martini. I liked that she didn’t like it dirty. I tried a dirty martini once, it was like salty... salty... it was like drinking the ocean if the ocean was made out of olives.
Occasionally she’d pull out a legal sized pad and take notes. On what, I’m not sure. By the way, I wasn’t trying to stare. She was directly in my line of vision.
I imagine after her iceburg salad, steak or bacon wrapped scallops and three martinis she probably pulled out of the parking lot in her 1992 Volvo Station wagon. Although her 3,000 square foot home with its commercial-grade kitchen was only 1/6 of a mile away, you know she didn’t drive because you never see fancy women like that just walking around the West End. Her youngest daughter usually uses the Volvo but she’s WOOFing in France now. It had better visibility than the Mercedes anyway, plus she liked the sentimental value of driving it. Yeah, she was a little tipsy but it was a very short drive if cops are going to venture into the West End, they don’t make it past Brackett, Spring, and the hospital respectively.
One thousand feet later, she pulled into the secret road between Carroll and Vaughn Streets in the West End that connects all of the garage/back entrance/guest houses and settled in for one more cognac in her fucking jacuzzi tub.
Or maybe she was just too exhausted from running her law firm all day to prepare herself a meal. Maybe she didn’t want to sit at the bar because she wanted some peace and quiet for a change. Maybe she was supposed to meet up with the Oshers and they’re still in San Francisco, or the Hagges, but they were at a fundraising dinner and this was her back up plan. All I know is while she was sitting alone at that table, with the dim lighting, Amelie soundtrack and blowing $65 before tip on a meal for one person, I wanted to be her. Minus her imagined kids.
September 25, 2012
September 8, 2012
If these walls could talk..
Hi there. I'm not going to bother making excuses for the unannounced Spring/Summer hiatus. Thank you for waiting! I've missed you!
Here's a short descriptive essay that I wrote in the Spring, about my old bedroom.
My eyes open from yet another crucial, rejuvinating afternoon nap. I channel my inner four year old and rub them with loose fists until the sleep is gone. My right arm made its way under the pillow again, this one sheathed in a goldenrod case of a slightly higher thread count. I prop myself up against the pillow and look around at my surroundings, this sad collection of belongings I call my most personal space. It’s late afternoon, and the sun is barely visible from through my single woven wooden shade. This peice made it’s way over from my previous place on Gilman Street, an attic apartment with long hallways, sloped ceilings and a thick layer of dust. I should be outside, enjoying the beautiful day, but sometimes I can’t resist a short snooze with my cat, Baby. I am the center of her universe, and she’s great at snuggling.
The closet door is closed for once; the carmel wood visible, free from its usual carpet of discarded clothing. Paint on the intricate tin ceiling is peeling, and although I’ve never found any chunks of paint on the floorl, exposed spots of black suggest otherwise. In one corner is my dresser, a small vintage piece bursting with clothes, its tired little legs barely able to support the weight. Situated like a faux-vanity is a polished piece of metal standing in for a mirror, propped on top and leaning against the wall. The reflection isn’t clear, so I never use it. I just like the shape, and it seems like an appropriate place to hold the tiny love letters my boyfriend attaches to the flowers he’s been so kind to have delivered to my door.
All of the surfaces and corners of the room are completely cluttered. On a small knee-high book shelf lives an ivory jewelry box, that girls my age likely coveted when we were young. It could stand in for a castle in a My-Little-Pony scenario, for those of us who prefered ponies to Barbies. I thrifted this one, though, and the music box in the bottom drawer stopped working long before it became a part of my life. On either side are random piles of papers; things I know I need to keep but have yet to find an appropriate place for. On floor under the bottom shelf is a black horizontal metal mailbox, shaped like a giant 3D letter, that I picked up at the hardware store a number of years ago, back when my friends and I had many zipcodes between us and we took the time to actually communicate in writing. Some of them I haven’t exchanged more than a Facebook “Like” with in years, but inside that box is evidence of a time when we took the time to consider what were the most important parts to share and seal in an envelope. We’d pay 35 cents to have someone carry it miles and miles. The functionality of the US Postal Service continues to blow my mind.
I am quite pleased with some of my art, however. There is triptych of sorts, three images in black frames on the wall opposite the door. It may not actually be a triptych, but there aren’t very many times that word comes up unless you’re discussing art history. The center image is of me. I’m leaning in a doorway, my back to the camera. I was 18, an art student at a school two miles from the North Shore of Massachusetts. The image was from a study another student in my building was doing, a color study. I was wearing dark denim Levi’s and a white tank top, which matched the door frame and connecting walls. My dyed-red curly hair blends in with the shadowy doorway. I can’t remember whose apartment that was, or why I was there. But the student who took it had the same name as me, her and her boyfriend were from Texas. He was going to Emerson, in the city, and they both left after the fall semester because he proposed and they wanted to plan their wedding.
The image to the left is a blind, one-line drawing a 3rd grade art student made at a summer program a dear friend of mine was teaching. It’s simple, and not terribly meaningful, but its small insignificant story makes me smile. On the opposite side is an image I picked up at a religiously owned thrift store. It’s a long exposure of a dark-haired woman wearing a striped shirt, leaning over a concrete balcony. She is faded, like a ghost, facing the camera and leaning forward into the balcony. It reminds me of Roman Holiday for some reason, although the woman isn’t pocket sized like Audrey Hepburn.
These images hang over a radiator that comes up to my waist. In the winter, I drape my towels over it so they’re warm when I step out of the shower and dry fast for re-use. Five feet away is a small, salvaged side table/plant stand, which I painted black. It came as a matching pair that I found outside of a mansion in a free pile on my way home, back when I lived on Park St. I used spray paint out on the back porch, and apparently the wind blew some on the next building over- my landlord made a huge deal of it when I moved out, but she never liked me anyway.
Next to my bed, between the end of the bed, which consists of a second-hand mattress and box spring that sits on the floor, is an end table, repurposed as a night table. There are about five empty or half-empty glasses and mugs. I try to remember which water is was most recently poured, so I can quickly quench my thirst before getting up to consummate my day.
Here's a short descriptive essay that I wrote in the Spring, about my old bedroom.
My eyes open from yet another crucial, rejuvinating afternoon nap. I channel my inner four year old and rub them with loose fists until the sleep is gone. My right arm made its way under the pillow again, this one sheathed in a goldenrod case of a slightly higher thread count. I prop myself up against the pillow and look around at my surroundings, this sad collection of belongings I call my most personal space. It’s late afternoon, and the sun is barely visible from through my single woven wooden shade. This peice made it’s way over from my previous place on Gilman Street, an attic apartment with long hallways, sloped ceilings and a thick layer of dust. I should be outside, enjoying the beautiful day, but sometimes I can’t resist a short snooze with my cat, Baby. I am the center of her universe, and she’s great at snuggling.
The closet door is closed for once; the carmel wood visible, free from its usual carpet of discarded clothing. Paint on the intricate tin ceiling is peeling, and although I’ve never found any chunks of paint on the floorl, exposed spots of black suggest otherwise. In one corner is my dresser, a small vintage piece bursting with clothes, its tired little legs barely able to support the weight. Situated like a faux-vanity is a polished piece of metal standing in for a mirror, propped on top and leaning against the wall. The reflection isn’t clear, so I never use it. I just like the shape, and it seems like an appropriate place to hold the tiny love letters my boyfriend attaches to the flowers he’s been so kind to have delivered to my door.
All of the surfaces and corners of the room are completely cluttered. On a small knee-high book shelf lives an ivory jewelry box, that girls my age likely coveted when we were young. It could stand in for a castle in a My-Little-Pony scenario, for those of us who prefered ponies to Barbies. I thrifted this one, though, and the music box in the bottom drawer stopped working long before it became a part of my life. On either side are random piles of papers; things I know I need to keep but have yet to find an appropriate place for. On floor under the bottom shelf is a black horizontal metal mailbox, shaped like a giant 3D letter, that I picked up at the hardware store a number of years ago, back when my friends and I had many zipcodes between us and we took the time to actually communicate in writing. Some of them I haven’t exchanged more than a Facebook “Like” with in years, but inside that box is evidence of a time when we took the time to consider what were the most important parts to share and seal in an envelope. We’d pay 35 cents to have someone carry it miles and miles. The functionality of the US Postal Service continues to blow my mind.
I am quite pleased with some of my art, however. There is triptych of sorts, three images in black frames on the wall opposite the door. It may not actually be a triptych, but there aren’t very many times that word comes up unless you’re discussing art history. The center image is of me. I’m leaning in a doorway, my back to the camera. I was 18, an art student at a school two miles from the North Shore of Massachusetts. The image was from a study another student in my building was doing, a color study. I was wearing dark denim Levi’s and a white tank top, which matched the door frame and connecting walls. My dyed-red curly hair blends in with the shadowy doorway. I can’t remember whose apartment that was, or why I was there. But the student who took it had the same name as me, her and her boyfriend were from Texas. He was going to Emerson, in the city, and they both left after the fall semester because he proposed and they wanted to plan their wedding.
The image to the left is a blind, one-line drawing a 3rd grade art student made at a summer program a dear friend of mine was teaching. It’s simple, and not terribly meaningful, but its small insignificant story makes me smile. On the opposite side is an image I picked up at a religiously owned thrift store. It’s a long exposure of a dark-haired woman wearing a striped shirt, leaning over a concrete balcony. She is faded, like a ghost, facing the camera and leaning forward into the balcony. It reminds me of Roman Holiday for some reason, although the woman isn’t pocket sized like Audrey Hepburn.
These images hang over a radiator that comes up to my waist. In the winter, I drape my towels over it so they’re warm when I step out of the shower and dry fast for re-use. Five feet away is a small, salvaged side table/plant stand, which I painted black. It came as a matching pair that I found outside of a mansion in a free pile on my way home, back when I lived on Park St. I used spray paint out on the back porch, and apparently the wind blew some on the next building over- my landlord made a huge deal of it when I moved out, but she never liked me anyway.
Next to my bed, between the end of the bed, which consists of a second-hand mattress and box spring that sits on the floor, is an end table, repurposed as a night table. There are about five empty or half-empty glasses and mugs. I try to remember which water is was most recently poured, so I can quickly quench my thirst before getting up to consummate my day.
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