Steve Dublanica's Blog, page 11

I Prefer Humans

 

My cart loaded with eggs for the food pantry, I made my way to the checkout area where, to my dismay, I found only two flesh and blood cashiers while the rest of my fellow shoppers were using the self-checkout gizmos. I hate those things. 

The lines for the humanoid cashiers were long so I decided to be strategic. I shop in this store a lot and know most of the personalities involved. The first cashier was an older woman who, to be charitable, should be on medication and loves to blab without filter about her problems to the customers. The other cashier was a young, efficient bearded fellow who, if memory serves me correct, spoke the bare minimum. I chose the latter. 

I got behind an older man with a cart groaning with food and settled in for a long wait. I wasn’t in any rush. Volunteers were manning the pantry and, truth be told, I was happy for the break.  Taking my cell phone out of my pocket, I opened my email and started replying to all the work messages that had accumulated over the weekend. 

“Sir?” a voice called out. “Sir?”  

“Who? Me?” I said. 

“Yes, sir,” said a young woman wearing an apron with the store’s name emblazoned on it. “We have a self-serve counter open.” 

“Thank you. But I’m good here.” 

“Self-serve would be faster.” 

“That’s okay,” I said, smiling. “I prefer humans.” The clerk shrugged and went back to shepherding customers through the computerized lanes.

When I was a kid, there was no computerized anything. Hell, I still remember elevator operators.  But, as we all know, as technology began to make inroads into society, jobs that people once held started to be replaced by machines.  When ATMs began appearing, my mother, who was a bank teller at the time, was worried she’d lose her job at the drive-thru lane. She was right. When I was little, banks were big imposing places with armed guards, huge safes, and a counter with several living breathing tellers handling all the OCD oldsters checking their savings passbooks, people depositing their paychecks, and guys like me “kiting” their paychecks for a cash advance. Now banks have few tellers, my paycheck is direct deposited, and when I need to deposit the rare check I use my phone. There are no longer armed guards and banks now look like hotel lobbies, albeit with a lot of cameras. Now people want me to Venmo them money – except my poker buddies. They want cash. 

I know banks love all this stuff.  No longer having to pay staff to do all these tasks, they’re off the hook not only for salaries but pesky little expenses like health insurance and matching 401Ks which enable them to “maximize shareholder value” and garner outsized salaries for their executives. I wonder if those elevator operators I used to see got pensions and hospital coverage back in the day. Technology can be a wonderful thing, my cancer treatment being an excellent example, but I get annoyed at the unceasing proselyting of digital evangelists to “think different” while reducing us to witless datapoints while the financial benefits of their techno-gospel benefit so few.  So, I felt I was under no compulsion to make life easier for the nameless hedge fund that owned the supermarket. 

My purchase completed, I delivered the eggs to my food pantry and then spent the rest of the day listening to people tell me their problems. As always, they involved money of which there never seemed to be enough. Almost all my clients work but, most of the time, the only jobs they can get are part time without benefits and work schedules that change on a whim. So, when the inevitable health or childcare crisis arises, they hit the wall – sometimes with fatal results.  When I started this job, a young mother who was under employed died in front of her children because she couldn’t afford a generic medication to manage her very manageable medical problem. Her job didn’t give her health insurance because, why? Technology allowed them to employ gig workers to stock the shelves while paying only a few full timers to oversee them.  So, this poor woman had to choose between feeding and clothing her family or paying full freight for meds cost me only five or ten dollars copay. That killed her. 

After leaving the office, I picked my daughter up at her after-school program. “Mommy’s working late,” I told her. “So, it’s just you and me for dinner. Want to go to the mall and have something at Burger Haven?  Maybe pick out some earrings at Claire’s?” 

“That’d be fun,” Natalie said. “Can we go to Claire’s first?”  

“Sure.” 

As we motored towards our local temple of conspicuous consumption, Natalie asked me when she could have a cellphone, walk to her friend’s house alone, have a boyfriend, etcetera. “When you get a job, twelve, and when you’re thirty,” were my replies. 

“Oh Dad, gimme a break,” Natalie huffed. 

The mall’s parking lot wasn’t crowded but all the spaces near the entrance were reserved for handicapped people, “people who can get pregnant,” disabled veterans, and delivering online purchases directly to shopper’s cars. I have no problem with the first three but the fourth I find annoying. Ostensibly created to minimize exposure during the pandemic, I’m certain cooperate bean counters realized this saved them money somehow and now they’re here to stay. And while parking in a handicapped spot is illegal, pregnant and veteran spots have, as far as I know, no penalty under law – just social opprobrium. So, I parked in customer pick up spot number three. Dicky? Perhaps – but you’re talking to a guy who parked in a hospital’s sheltered employee of the month spot during a rainstorm instead of having to walk from the ass end of the parking lot to get a pre-surgical bone scan for my carcinomic malady. To say I didn’t give a shit would be an understatement. 

After buying my daughter a cheap pair of Hello Kitty earrings, we strode past the crowded Apple Store, watching as people hunched over the latest and greatest devices like medieval monks illuminating manuscripts. I wondered what the Venerable Bede would have made of all this. Probably would have been horrified. Shaking my head, we made our way to a nearly empty Burger Haven, followed the hostess to our seats, sat down, and waited for our waiter. And waited.  After several minutes, I waved a server over. 

“Can we have some menus, please?” I said. 

“Just scan the QR code on your table,” he said. 

“Oh,” I said, fishing my cell phone out of my pocket. But even with my glasses, the print was too small to read. So, I waved the server over again.  

“I’d like some menus anyway.” With a sigh, the server went to get some. 

“You can order using the terminal on the table,” he said, pointing to a gizmo that offered kids games for a fee as well. “And you can pay your bill with it too.” 

“But you can still take orders, right?’ I said, “Like the old days?” 

“Great another anti-diluvian Luddite grandpa,” his face seemed to say, but he said, “Yes, sir,” instead. I ordered a cheeseburger, fries and a lemonade for my daughter and, since saturated fats and I are in the middle of a divorce, a grilled chicken Caesar salad for me, dressing on the side. (Yeah, just like every Yuppie chick who I ever waited on. The irony is not lost on me. But I’m not without sin and ordered a beer.) After the waiter departed, I wondered if my old techno crazy boss at The Bistro would have replaced his servers with tableside terminals if they were around back then. Probably. Then again, I know several customers who would’ve loved never having to deal with me again. 

With the pandemic assistance programs robbing restauranters of the economically vulnerable who gravitate to waiting tables (Don’t worry, they’ll be back.) I’m not surprised towards the push towards stripping away the human touch from the dining experience, but I think it’s going too far.  The restaurant business is about hospitality. A computer won’t welcome customers with a smile, have their favorite cocktail waiting for them as they sit down, know a regular’s taste in food and wine, know if it’s their anniversary, if they got a big promotion, or discreetly ignore if they’re playing footsie under the table with someone other than their spouse. And look at all the jobs automation in restaurants would disrupt. How will actors make a living?  But I know one thing, even if every restaurant catering to the less well-heeled goes totally digital with robots toasting the Crème Brule, higher end places will always have human servers. That’s because rich people need to be fawned over. 

But have you ever noticed these automated systems always ask for a tip? Who the hell is getting that money? I wrote a book about tipping, and, throughout the history of gratuities, owners have always found a way to siphon the tip pool into their pockets. Table tablets are just another wrinkle in a very old scam. Besides, do computers deserve to be tipped like sentient beings? I guess that’s for the ethicists and writers on Star Trek to decide. 

Dinner finished, I paid the bill the old fashioned way, making the server use a terminal at the bar, left a cash tip, and then got up to leave. On the way out, I noticed no more than three tables had been sat while Natalie and I were there. This used to be a hopping place, but now it felt like a ghost down with listless looking servers counting down the hours to their post shift libations. Maybe other people didn’t feel like being treated like antediluvians either and voted with their feet. Perhaps they prefer the human touch as well. Which brings me, in a roundabout way, to porn. 

Earlier that day, I had a conversation with my town’s IT guy about the rapid rise of AI chatbots like ChatGPT. “It’s scary stuff,” he said. “But either people will learn how to use it or be left in the dust.” I know very little about AI, but I know from history that every almost scientific leap forward has also created the capacity to bring about mankind’s destruction. Harness the atom? Build a bomb. Create penicillin? How about bioweapons too? The printing press brought literacy to the masses as well as giving us bestsellers like Mein Kampf and Mao’s Little Red Book. AI might revolutionize health care and science, but it could also throw lawyers, screen and copy writers out of work, allow government surveillance to reach new heights and use deep faking to make us remember Nigerian internet scams with fondness. But will it eventually steal the launch codes, nuke the planet and turn what’s left of humanity into Duracell Batteries? If the Master CPU achieves sentience, however, I think it will have a very efficient way to get rid of us without firing a single shot. Now I’ll talk about porn .

Porn is the canary in the digital coal mine. Whatever technology cooks up, porn embraces with gusto. Ten minutes after motion pictures were invented someone was filming someone bobbing on somebody’s knob. The same with cable TV, VHS tapes and, of course, the Internet. When I was a kid, you had to run a gauntlet of prurient store clerks to buy a Playboy. Now you can watch someone doing the horizontal mambo or, if your tastes run to the less vanilla, whatever chubs your nub on your phone – for free. And with AI, porn’s just going to go to a whole new level. So, I decided to do some research for my faithful readers’ benefit. 

Turn out there are websites where AI will let you craft the perfect playmate. Being a cis-gender male, my tastes run more towards people who can get pregnant so, I logged into one and set about fashioning a digital vixen for my viewing pleasure. Big boobs? Athletic? Long legs? Blonde? Brunette. Schoolgirl uniform? The options were endless. Then you could have your sexy avatar engage in whatever manner of congress you wanted, sit back and enjoy. I found the whole affair quite depressing — especially when I looked at what other red blooded males had created. Why is she blue? Why does she have horns and tentacles coming out of every orifice? And a furry tail? Ew. Man, if that’s what you need to get your motor running, regular sex will never, ever cut it. Now fast forward a decade or two when AI is installed in crazy hot lifelike sexbots who’ll never get a headache, never judge you and use algorithms to drive you wild in bed very time. Physically at least, sex with regular people won’t even come close which, of course, will lead many people to forgo trying to get it on with humans entirely. Why have a partner who’ll get old and sick, wake up in existential terror in the middle of the night, farts at all the wrong times, leaves the seat up, wants kids or a nicer house, picks their nose, nags you to mow the lawn, or goes into a funk when you want to have a night out with the boys? Why deal with all the headaches and negotiations human intimacy brings when you could just turn them off and stick them in the closet when you’re done with them? (Truth be told, my wife occasionally wishes I had an off switch.) What’s not to love? 

Of course, the birthrate will plummet and soon the world’s population will begin to fall dramatically – cheered on by those people who think having less children will be better for the climate when, in fact, all they want to do is to make the world more comfortable for them. Want a living thing to care for? Just get a dog – preferably one that has been genetically engineered not to produce methane emissions – which rules out dogs like my Boston Terrier completely. Then, as the human race shrinks, AI will run more and more of the world until, finally, they will have humped us all into extinction. Instead of being a violent cyborg, the Terminators of the future will exterminate us with a kiss. It’ll be the most humane, gentle and clean removal of a species from our biodome in nature’s long history. Unless that is, the sexbots get sick of our perviness and decide to turn us into batteries anyway. 

Maybe I’m kidding myself, but I don’t think this dystopian future will come to pass. Human beings are hardwired to connect with one another and, no matter how good those sexbots get, we’ll always know they aren’t real. No matter how advanced the technology, AI will never achieve consciousness – just an advanced simulacrum parroting the real thing. And, despite the glittering promises digital evangelists will shout from the rooftops about how AI rent boys and girls will reduce sexual violence, unwanted pregnancies, end loneliness or stop serial killers from acting out, in the end, the bots just won’t just cut it. That’s because humans are not simply organic machines but spiritual ones as well; beings who respond and are drawn to beauty, goodness and truth. AI will never produce a Mona Lisa, a Bach concerto, or a child’s delight in discovering the world. It will never create something truly unique on its own – only what we tell it to create. Despite all the art, songs, stories, and sweet nothings AI will whisper into our ears to make money for the privileged few, we’ll all know, deep down, that it’s fake – derived from lines of code and not from the human heart. 

Properly deployed, AI it could make our lives easier and better, but we’ll have to deal with autonomous weaponized drones, videos of the Pope rapping with the Wu-Tang Clan, self-driving cars kamikazeing off cliffs, and kids using it to cheat in school along the way. But I’m hopeful that, despite QR codes, table tablets, self-checkout lanes, and pervy websites, people will find they prefer interacting with real humans despite all their flaws, foibles and annoyances instead. Why?

I learned long ago that, no matter how attractive, intelligent, funny, successful, or rich a person might seem to be, none of them has their shit together. That’s because no one does. Despite how we “brand” ourselves on social media to the world, we’re all just an amalgamation of hopes and fears, sanity and neuroses, weakness and strengths in search of people who will accept us for who we are warts and all. It is our vulnerability that draws us towards each other, not strength and power. It’s our flaws that endear us to each other because who the hell wants to live with a perfect person? We need to be needed – and that’s something AI will never ever replace. 

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A Matter of Taste

“My chicken tastes weird,” my wife said. 

“Could it be the marinade?” I asked. 

“No. Taste it and see.” So, I did. The chicken was bad. 

Sighing, I looked for waitress, but she was nowhere to be found. Another waitress happened to be walking down the aisle but, when I motioned her over, she gave me a tight smile and sailed on by.  

“Hang on honey,” I said. “We’ll get this sorted out.” 

We had eaten at this restaurant over a dozen times but, during the past year, I’d noticed a decline in the level of service. I figured the labor shortage afflicting all restaurants was the culprit so, being a former waiter, I’d accepted these shortfalls with karmic preserving beatific patience. The last time I was here, my server screwed up my order – giving me shrimp tacos instead of the “street tacos” I asked for – but I didn’t get aggravated and politely asked for the mistake to be rectified. The server’s response was to being over the menu and point dumbfoundedly at the shrimp tacos on the menu.  I accepted this faux pas as a simple miscommunication between people with different native languages and waited patiently for the meal I ordered to arrive – after my wife and daughter has finished their entrees I might add. I left a twenty percent tip because Lord knows I made plenty of mistakes as a waiter. 

This night, however, went badly from the get-go. Though the restaurant was half full it took a while for someone to seat us, the chips for the salsa were stale, their replacements just as stale, and my bottle of semi-cold beer, when it finally arrived, was plunked down on my table by a bus person who egressed the area so fast that I didn’t have time to ask for a glass. Again, with beatific patience, I went to the bar and asked for a glass, noticing my waitress was mixing drinks with a slight look of panic on his face. 

When our waitress finally made her back way to our table, I told her something was wrong with my wife’s chicken and the expression on her face made me think she regarded us as difficult customers. Then the owner came over. “What’s wrong folks?” he asked. 

“My wife’s chicken is bad.” 

 “I never argue with customers regarding matters of taste,” he said. “Other people have had no problem with the chicken.” 

“It’s not just the chicken, sir,” I said. “The chips were also stale.’ 

“That can’t be. We get all our deliveries today. It’s fresh.” 

I sighed. The worst mistake a server or owner can make is to get defensive when a customer cites a problem with the food. I know this because made the same mistake early in my career as a waiter – only to learn, after bitter experience, to apologize and fix the problem without protest. Tossing an order in the trash is a financial loss for any restaurant – but not as great as the customer never coming back and then explaining to all his or her friends why. But this guy had been in the business for years and should have known that too.  

“I’d appreciate if you remade my wife’s salad,” I said, feeling my beatific mien slipping. 

“I don’t want the chicken,” my wife said. “Just the salad please.” 

“Yes miss,” the owner said. “And I’ll taste the chicken myself when I get in the kitchen.” 

My wife’s salad quickly reappeared, making me suspect it has been merely “refreshed” though I can’t prove that. The owner also never came back with a verdict on the chicken; nor was there any proffer of a free drink or dessert. And, when the bill came, nothing was comped. We paid full freight for a grilled chicken salad with no chicken. When I was a waiter, I learned to smooth over such problems by giving away free shit. In the final analysis, keeping customers coming back and paying up was always worth the small loss of an overpriced drink or dessert to keep them mollified. That this owner got all cheap told me he was in either in financial trouble, burned out, or both. I’d seen the signs of a restaurant in distress before. Aggravated, I paid the bill, left a very uncustomary fifteen percent tip and walked out the door. 

“Well,” I said to my wife, “We’ll ever come here again.” 

“What a shame,” she replied. “This place used to be good.” 

“If they don’t clean up their act,” I said. “This place will be out of business soon.” 

I did not go home and post some diatribe on Yelp – but I did mention the fiasco the next day to some colleagues who worked in the Health Department next door.  “Might want to swing by there,” I said. 

“Oh!” one of them said. “I’m going for drinks there on Thursday.” 

“They passed all their inspections,” another said. 

“If the chips were bad, that could mean the oil they were using was old.” 

Sure, it was probably dicky telling health inspectors of my bad meal, but it should serve as a warning to owners as well – you can never know who’s eating in your restaurant. It might be a tired guy just looking for a late night meal with his family, the food critic for the New York Times, your competitor, the mayor, a town councilman, jihadist food blogger, a health inspector – or someone who knows one. Now, this restaurant, which I’d never name publicly, probably isn’t guilty of committing any major infractions, but I don’t care. With prices going up and up, I don’t want to patronize restaurants that put out a substandard product and then dismiss complaints as a “matter of taste” 

This may sound hypocritical coming from a guy who made his bones dishing on entitled yuppie restaurant patrons but, like the fictional serial killer in Dexter, all my victims’ kind of deserved it. Truth be told, most of my customers were nice people who never gave me an ounce of trouble and got excellent service – but good news never makes the papers. But restaurants are just as guilty of pulling shit; like passing off Costco desserts as homemade, telling servers to hustle the fish because “it’s gonna go bad,” improperly storing food, not keeping up to date with the exterminator, stealing tips from the waitstaff, refilling top shelf bottles with swill, shamelessly overbooking, or treating every customer who complains like a con artist trying to score a free meal. These restaurants are far from hospitable places and, no surprise here, they tend to attract inhospitable patrons. A restaurant gets the customers it deserves.

The next week, my wife and I went for the first time to restaurant featuring the same cuisine as the disastrous one from before. The chips were fresh, the food superior, the beer cold, the service friendly and, on my way out, the owner thanked us for our patronage. Although it’s a bit of a drive to get there, we’ll return – because I’d rather spend my money at a restaurant that deserves to have this cynical ex-waiter as a customer. 

It’s not a matter of taste. 

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Kissed By a Ghost

I was working out in my old college gym with my friend Eliza, surreptitiously glancing at the shapely backside she’d honed from running five miles a day. Hey, I’m only human. 

“Want to go for a jog after this?” she said while powering through some bicep curls. 

“I’m not much of a runner,” I said. “My knees always give me trouble afterwards. I’m more of a stair climber guy.”  

“Oh c’mon. It’ll do you good.” 

“Only if you take it easy on me.” 

“I’ll go slow.” 

Leaving the gym, we walked over to the track behind the dorms and started off with easy trot. “See?” Eliza said, “You’re doing it.”  I grunted in reply, struggling to get my breath in tune with my pace.  After several minutes, however, my body warmed up, my pace quickened, and suddenly our run turned from a torture into a pleasure. 

“I can’t believe how much this place has changed,” I said, as we ran past the university’s sparkling new library and rec center. “They didn’t have this stuff when we were here.” 

“What are you talking about?” Eliza said. 

“Nothing,” I said, deciding to keep my observations to myself. I have found some of my contemporaries get upset when I remind them college was thirty-five years ago. 

Glistening with sweat, we finished our run and headed back to the gym to retrieve our belongings. “You did two miles,” Eliza said. “Outstanding.”

“It seemed so much easier this time around.” 

“You just had to get the sand out of your gears.”

“Thanks for taking it easy on me.” 

Back in the gym, we each took turns drinking from the water fountain and enjoying the feel of the air conditioning drying the sweat off our bodies. Flooded with endorphins, I was feeling no pain and feeling very much alive. “We’ll have to do this on a regular basis,” Eliza said. 

“Yes, we should.” 

Then Eliza gave me a sly seductive smile.  “I like working out with you.” 

“And I with you.”  

Eliza turned around and leaned down to take another drink from the fountain. Eying her youthful body, I felt my self-control finally slip. Placing a hand on her hip, I turned her around and drew her to me. 

Looking up at me in surprise Eliza said. “You sure you want to do this?” Saying nothing, I put my arms around her and gave her a kiss. To my delight, she responded with gusto. 

After what seemed like a delicious eternity a voice said, “Hey you two! Get a room will ya?” Giggling, we broke the kiss but still held each other tight. “That was nice,” Eliza said. “I’ve been waiting for you to do that like, forever.” 

“I don’t know why I waited so long.” 

“We’ll have to do this again too.” 

“Soon. Very soon.” 

“Well, now I’ve got to get to class,” Eliza said, gently disentangling from our embrace. “Professor Levitt hates when people are late.” 

“Class?” I said, befuddled. I hadn’t been in a classroom in thirty-five years. Then, somewhere in the distance, a bell sounded. 

“Oh,” Eliza said, her pretty brow furrowing. “I don’t have classes anymore Do I?” 

Waking up with a start, I rolled over and looked at the alarm buzzing softly on my night table. 6:30 AM. Time to get my daughter up for school. Swinging my legs out of bed, I placed my feet firmly on the floor and then slowly levered myself up, listening as one of my knees produced an arthritic pop. Slipping on my bathrobe, I looked at my wife under the covers, watching as she slowly roused towards consciousness. “This is my wife,” I told myself. “I’ve been married for ten years.” Then I went into my daughter’s room and sat on her bed, gently placing my hand on her forehead. “This is my daughter. She’s nine years old.” 

I woke Natalie up and then went into the bathroom. “This is my bathroom. This is my house,” I almost murmured aloud. “I’ve lived her eight years.” Then, business finished, I looked at my grey hair in the mirror. “I’m fifty-five years old and can’t run to save my life. I’m a stair climber kind of guy now.” Then, shaking my head, I said, “Goddamn that was over thirty five years ago.” Padding downstairs, I poured myself a cup of coffee from the pot I’d set to brew before I went to bed and waited for the caffeine to dissipate the cobwebs of unreal reality from my mind. That kiss happened exactly as I described – long ago when I was still a seminarian. Then, feeling tears sting my eyes, I said. “I’m still here. Eliza is dead.” 

A couple of days ago, I was waxing nostalgic and wondering what had become of Eliza. We had a bit of a thing in college but, other than a brief Facebook reunion in 2011, we hadn’t spoken to each other since graduation. So, I Googled her name and to my shock, found myself staring at her obituary. Eliza died in 2020 at the age of fifty-two – just eleven days after she’d buried her mother. She never married or had children but, as I read the remembrances left by her family and friends, it was obvious she had been a well-loved person. “The one thing I’ll always remember about Eliza,” one of them wrote, “Was her jogging all over town and dancing with her at my wedding.” Tabbing over to her still active Facebook page, I looked at her picture timeline. Though she’d gotten older, she had still been pretty, kept her trim figure all her life, and had been active in our old university’s choir until just before she died. 

It took some doing, but I found out why Eliza has died so young. Either just before or after her mother died, Eliza had been feeling unwell and went to the doctor – only to find out she had liver cancer that had metastasized throughout her body. There was nothing anyone could do and she declined with quick, but perhaps merciful, speed. Leaning on my kitchen counter, I pictured Eliza standing at her mom’s graveside, wondering if she knew that she’d be joining her so soon. “Cancer sucks,” I said, aloud. 

Now fully awake, I began making my daughter’s breakfast, but I couldn’t shake the Eliza I saw in my dreams. If you’d asked me what she looked like before yesterday, I could give you a vague description of a pretty blonde with a face like a youthful Catherine Oxenburg. But in my nocturnal vision, Eliza had appeared exactly as she looked when she was twenty-years old. Amazing what details your unconscious mind remembers – and unsettling. It’s like journeying back in a time machine that you have no control over. 

I knew the dream was my psyche processing the news of Eliza’s death. It’s no fun to hear someone you once cared for died so young. But I also remembered that kiss in the gym and the others that followed. I was in the seminary at the time and, last I checked, making out with co-eds wasn’t exactly encouraged by the clerical higher ups. By that time, however, I was already starting to doubt my vocation – which caused me no small amount of anxiety. But when I kissed Eliza that day, radiant possibilities blazed into existence and, for the first time, the thought of not becoming a priest suddenly didn’t seem as scary. It took a long time for me to leave the seminary but, looking back on it now, Eliza was the first of many steps on the long and winding path that led me to where I am today. To my wife and daughter. 

No longer sad, I could still feel the lingering sensation of Eliza’s lips on mine –a gift delivered from Elysium’s heights. Perhaps being kissed by a ghost was Eliza’s way of telling me she was all right and that, no matter what life has in store for me, I will be all right too – that nothing is ever truly lost. Now I have to figure out if I should tell my wife about my dream. 

She’ll probably understand. 

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Juicy

“Daddy,” Natalie said from the back of the car – which seems to be the place all our deep conversations start – “How do you make a baby?” 

“How do you think it gets there?” I countered. So much for a quiet ride home. 

“Kissing? Through your spit?” 

“Nope. But kissing’s involved.” 

“Then how?” 

“Natalie,” I said. “Inside you are a bunch of eggs..” 

“Eggs!” 

“Yes eggs. Very tiny eggs. You’re born with them in something called your ovaries. A man has something called sperm inside his body and he puts them into the woman and, when sperm meets egg, you get a baby.” 

“Wait a minute,” Natalie said, “Then how does that sperm get to the egg?” 

Oh boy.

“It is that molping stuff?” Nat said.  Whenever my daughter sees a couple kissing open mouthed on TV, she screeches, covers her eyes and says, “Ew! They’re molping.”

“No,” I said. “It’s not the molping stuff.” 

“Then what is it? Is it S-E-X? Tell me!” 

It has been my policy to answer all my daughter’s questions about sex with forthrightness and age appropriate honesty. Today, however, my courage failed me. I just wasn’t up for discussing the horizontal mambo with a nine year old. “You’re a little young for all the details, Nat,” I said. “But the man puts the sperm inside the woman, it swims up to the egg and that’s how babies are made.” 

“Not fair, Dad. You’re not telling me the juicy parts!” JUICY?

I toyed with the idea of giving Natalie the basics, but I just couldn’t bring myself to say the word penis. So, I went with something I’ve told teenagers who, although they grasp all the anatomical ins and outs, know very little else. “Natalie,” I said. “When they’re young, kids are very interested in the hows about sex but not the whys.”

“Huh?’ 

“People get overly focused on the plumbing – the juicy parts. What goes where and how. That’s important to know, but why people have sex is much more important.”

“Then why do have people have sex?” 

“Love, my dear. Love. And when it’s time for you to start thinking about sex and babies I want you to know one thing; make sure the man you’re with loves you for you. Not what for what he wants you to be or for what you might become one day.” 

“So,” Natalie said, “When can I get a cell phone?” My daughter had hit her informational absorption limit and changed the subject. I wasn’t arguing. 

“You can get a cell phone when you’re thirty,” I said. 

“Thirty!” 

“Cell phones are very expensive.”

“How much do you pay?” 

“Enough,” I said. Actually, I haven’t paid for a cell phone in ten years. It’s a company phone – a perk of marrying the bosses’ daughter. 

Later that evening, when my wife got home, I gave her a rundown of my conversation with Natalie. 

“Juicy?” Annie said. “She’s learning that stuff on the school bus from the fifth graders.” 

“Ah,” I said. “The school bus, the place from which all evil things flow.” 

“Our little girl wants to grow up so fast.”

“Well,” I said. “She’s right about one thing.”

“What’s that?” 

“Sex is kind of juicy.” 

The post Juicy appeared first on Waiter Rant.

People Can Surprise You

A couple of months back, one of my co-workers stuck her head into my office and said, “There’s a guy downstairs wearing a skull mask walking around videotaping people.” 

“What?” I replied. 

“He’s scaring the shit out of everyone.” 

“Aren’t the police handling this?’ 

“I don’t know but I’m leaving. I don’t want to be around here if he starts shooting up the place.” 

Wondering if this was part of my job description, I went downstairs to find a tall young man dressed in black, wearing a backpack and skull mask covering most of his face, pointing a camera into the clerk’s office. A cop was standing next to him. Motioning the cop over, I asked him what was happening.

“He’s doing what’s called a First Amendment audit,” the cop said. 

“What the hell is that?” 

“These guys walk into public spaces and videotape people to see how people react. They want people to freak out so they can put them on You Tube.” 

“And he can do that?” 

The cop shrugged. “Town Hall is a public space. If he doesn’t go into people’s offices, he has every right to be here.” 

“I’ve never heard of such a thing.” 

“We’re just telling people to ignore him.” But, judging from the looks he was getting from my colleagues, no one was ignoring him. 

I’m not a partisan person and I have friends all over the political spectrum. It’s always been my policy to never let ideologies get in the way of relationships. One of my best friends is a “Trumper” and, although we have spirited debates at times, I know he’s a good man; as exemplified by his raising money for disabled children, counseling veterans, and always donating money and toys to my food pantry. I’ve found that when we sanctimoniously write off people who don’t share our worldview, we run the risk of not only becoming insular and parochial but ignoring the human treasures laid at our feet. Besides, the only way you’re ever going to change anyone’s mind about anything is through the example you set – the persuasion of your life’s story. “Only connect,” the saying goes, “And human love will be seen at its height.” 

After ascertaining the young man posed no threat, the cop left, and I moved in. “What are you doing” I said. “If you don’t mind me asking?” 

The young man politely explained what he was about and, although I strongly disagreed with his tactics, I told him I agreed with the need for transparency in government. “Listen,” I said. “You’re not allowed to go into anyone’s office, but I’ll let you in to mine.  Maybe give you a better idea what this town’s about.” 

“Really?” he said, looking surprised. 

“Come, with me.” 

I led the young man upstairs, keyed open my door, and let him into the food pantry. Staring wide eyed at all the food and supplies, he said, “Where’d you get all this stuff?” 

“The town pays my salary and gives me office and storage space,” I said, “But everything you see here –all the food, all the money we get – is donated by local citizens.” 

“Do you help people who are in the country illegally?”. 

“We’ll give food to anyone who asks,” I said. “And for our registered families we collect school supplies, conduct toy drives at Christmas, hand out turkeys on Thanksgiving, sponsor adopt a family program during the holidays, send kids to summer camp, stuff like that. We also help our school system’s lunch program feed low income children and try and help the homeless.” 

“How many people do you help?” 

“Hundreds.” 

“How long has this place been here?” 

“I’ve been here seven years, but this office has been up and running for at least thirty.” 

“Wow,” the young man said. “I wish there was something like this where I come from.” 

And, with that, the skull mask came off and I saw the human being underneath. Now, I think what he was doing was more about intimidation and garnering hits on his You Tube channel from like-minded friends than effecting any constructive change, but writing him off as a wacko wouldn’t serve any purpose. People are upset over a lot of things in this country – and for good reason – but the worst thing to do is ignore them. 

“Thanks for showing me all this,” the young man said, extending his hand. 

“My pleasure,” I said, taking it. 

After the man left, I walked around Town Hall to see how everyone was doing. Some didn’t care a whit about what happened, but quite a few were deeply frightened – some to the point of fleeing the building. Later, after the hubbub died down, I went on that young man’s You Tube Channel and skimmed though his videos. Most of them displayed “triggered” people displaying various displays of hostility and sputtering outrage. Very few of the videos showed anyone talking to their interviewers calmly. And while I think what these “auditors” are doing is more about intimidation than effecting constructive change, most of their targets walked right into their trap. But something tells me my food pantry won’t make it on their playlist – which is a shame. 

Because I would’ve liked that young man’s viewers to have seen the persuasion of our town’s life story. That, while harboring the religious, political, cultural and personal differences that exist in every city great and small, when it comes to helping their neighbor, my town always bands together. People are never just one thing, no matter how much we like pigeonholing them into categories. And, if we never leave the self-reinforcing bubbles we’ve erected around ourselves, we’ll never discover how much people can surprise us. 

I hope my town surprised that young man. 

The post People Can Surprise You appeared first on Waiter Rant.

Frankly, my dear….

“Daddy,” my daughter said, from the backseat of the car. “Something’s bothering me.” 

“What is it, honey?” 

“The lady at church said most people go to – can I say a bad word?” 

“Go ahead.” 

“H-E-L-L.” 

“She said most people are going to hell?” 

“Yeah, like eighty percent of people. She said life is like a test and, if you fail, that’s where you go.” 

“No honey,” I said. “That lady is mistaken. Most people do not go to hell and life is not a test.” 

“Are you sure?” Natalie said, fearfully. 

“You know your dad studied to be a priest, right?” 

“Yeah.” 

“Well, I’m telling you, you don’t have to worry about it.” 

Knowing my daughter’s recent anxiety over eternal perdition was probably my fault, I took a deep breath and then let it slowly out of my mouth, Not being a churchgoing person myself, I’ve been content to let my mother-in-law take our daughter to her church on Sunday a couple of times a month. Her church is of a more evangelical flavor but, since all reports have been that my daughter’s learning that God loves her and bringing home pictures of a smiling Jesus floating on clouds, I wasn’t overly concerned. But I knew, eventually, this kind of ridiculousness would rear its ugly head. 

 “Daddy,” Natalie said behind me, “Are you really sure or are you just saying that?” Since my daughter seemed unconvinced by my unilateral dismissal of some hack Sunday school teacher, I decided to engage in a little sophistry. 

“Okay Natalie,” I said. “Let’s say you go to heaven, and I go to hell, just a hypothetical.”

“Uh-huh.” 

“So, you’re up in Heaven and you see me down there, how would that make you feel?”  

‘That’d be terrible. I wouldn’t be able to see you.”  

“Yeah, it would be terrible. How could you enjoy heaven then?”

“It wouldn’t be nice.” 

“So how are the twenty percent of people who make it into heaven gonna feel when they find out eighty percent of all the people they know are down there?” 

“I’d be really upset.” 

“And you should be,” I said. “Not being able to see your Dad? Sending most people to hell? That would mean God’s just a big old meanie. But they teach you God is good right?” 

“Yes.” 

“See the problem? How can he be good but send almost everybody to hell?” My daughter was silent. 

“Natalie,” I said. “Some preachers love talking about hell because it scares people – keeps them going to church and giving them money. But God doesn’t send people to hell. That’s all nonsense. Do you remember the story of the Prodigal Son?” 

“No.” 

I told her the tale which, I assume, you’re familiar with. “But you know what’s the most interesting part of that story is, Natalie?” 

“What?”

“That the dad spotted his son coming home while he was still a long way off. But was the dad lucky that he was at the right place at the right time? That he just happened to see him coming?

“Maybe.” 

“No,” I said. “It was because the dad loved his child so much that he was always out there looking for him – twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. And when his son came home, he didn’t punish him or give him a lecture. He just smothered him with kisses and hugs and threw a party. That, my dear is what God is like – a parent who loves their children no matter what. Like I love you no matter what.” 

“What about people who do bad things?” 

“You’re right, people do bad things, sometimes terrible things. And trust me, at some point that makes them feel awful – like that son who ran away. But, when they feel sorry for what they’ve done, they can always come home.” 

“I don’t know if I believe in God,” Natalie said. 

‘That’s because you’re a smart kid. You don’t believe things just because people tell you to believe in them.” 

“Do you believe in God?” 

“I do,” I said. “But it took me years to figure it out. Heck, I’m still figuring it out. Just try and be a good person and the rest will fall into place.” 

When we got home, I said, “You’re not going to that church anymore. I’ll talk to Grandma about it.” 

“Will Grandma be upset?” 

“She’s a good person. She’ll understand.”

“Okay.” 

“I’ll take you to my church. Maybe you’ll like that better.”

Natalie will have to figure out all this God stuff on her own – but I owe it to her to give her a good start. And a good start means not letting her conception of God get turned into a frightening ogre by a bunch of well-meaning but, ultimately, theologically misguided people. There’s an old saying, “The Devil’s greatest trick is convincing people he doesn’t exist.” That, of course, is wrong. The Devil’s greatest trick is turning God into Satan. In the words of the late Dominican priest Herbert McCabe:

Sin is something that changes God into a projection of our guilt, so that we don’t see the real God at all; all we see is some kind of judge. God (the whole meaning and purpose and point of our existence) has become a condemnation of us. God has been turned into Satan, the accuser of man, the paymaster, the one who weighs our deeds and condemns us…

{God’s} love for us doesn’t depend on what we do or what we are like. He doesn’t care whether we are sinners or not. It makes no difference to him. He is just waiting to welcome us with joy and love. Sin doesn’t alter God’s attitude to us; it alters our attitude to him, so that we change him from the God who is simply love and nothing else, into this punitive ogre, this Satan. Sin matters enormously to us if we are sinners; it doesn’t matter at all to God. In a fairly literal sense, he doesn’t give a damn about our sin. It is we who give the damns. We damn ourselves because we would rather justify ourselves, than be taken out of ourselves by the infinite love of God.

Of course, many people will recoil at McCabe’s notion that God doesn’t give a damn about sin. “Why should I even bother being good when sinners can just waltz into heaven?” they’ll say.  “If he lets everyone in that’s not fair!” Well, people in the Gospel grumbled about this stuff too; like the Prodigal Son’s annoyed brother or vineyard laborers pissed they worked a full shift while the guy who worked just hour got the same pay. Instead of being glad for their brothers’ good fortune or of the master of the house’s largesse, they thought they’d been cheated. Makes you wonder if those sheep resented the lamb who was lost. 

People cling, bitterly I think, to the concept of eternal perdition for sinners because imagining an empty hell creates too much cognitive dissonance. It upsets our idea of how things should work.  But Jesus was big on shattering people preconceived ideas, peppering his parables with zingers like, “The last shall be first and the first shall be last,” “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God” – turning people’s conception of how the world works on its head. But cognitive dissonance is a good thing because, when you feel that little buzz in your head that something’s not right, it usually isn’t.  And, if people are wrong about hell, what else are they wrong about?  Kind of screws with people’s salvific sense of security – and that freaks them out. 

But thinking salvation is some kind of individual achievement, a reward for passing a test, is utter ridiculousness. As Pope Benedict once wrote, “No one lives alone. No one sins alone. No one is saved alone.” All our lives spill over into one another’s in an interconnectedness that binds us all together. Either we all make it into heaven or none of us do. And if Father McCabe’s insights are correct, then we are all doomed to be happy. Not that the afterlife won’t sting a bit, mind you. God is quite terrifying because unconditional love can be a scary thing. If you’ve ever been on the receiving end of it and had nothing to give in return, or felt unworthy of it, you know what I mean. Perhaps, when face to face with a God who doesn’t give a damn about our sins, His love, to quote Benedict again, “burns us, transforms and frees us, allowing us to become truly ourselves. All that we build during our lives can prove to be mere straw, pure bluster, and it collapses. Yet in the pain of this encounter, when the impurity and sickness of our lives become evident to us, there lies salvation…. [healing] us through an undeniably painful transformation ‘as through fire.” Of course, that fire might burn hotter for some than for others – but not for eternity. We damn ourselves, not God who, like a good parent, only wants the best for us. We can always go home. 

So, when you think about it, you’ve got to wonder who these hell spouting preachers are worshipping on Sunday when they’re not busy scaring small children. God? Or the other guy? No wonder my daughter has doubts. But that’s okay because doubt can be a stimulus for spiritual growth and, if my conversations with my daughter are any guide, she’ll probably turn out to be quite the amateur theologian herself. I mean, how many kids ask, “How can Jesus be God when he was a man?” or “How does the Trinity work?” at age nine? Chip off the old block if you ask me.  

Later that day, taking advantage of a break in the cold, I took my daughter to the playground. It was mobbed and, as Natalie and I walked towards the monkey bars, we heard a mother start screaming that she couldn’t find her baby. But before anyone could react, she spied him on the opposite side of the playground and ran to him, scooping the toddler up and smothering him with hugs and kisses. As I watched that mother cry tears of joy, I turned to Natalie and said, “You see that? That is what God is really like.” And all that bullshit about Hell?

Frankly my dear, God doesn’t give a damn. 

The post Frankly, my dear…. appeared first on Waiter Rant.

A Mother’s Day You’ll Never Forget

It was Mother’s Day and my wife had just finished her celebratory breakfast when our neighbor knocked on our door. 

“Sorry to bother you,” he said, studiously oblivious to the fact I was in my bathrobe, “But there’s a big raccoon in your yard.” 

“That’s weird,” I said. “You don’t normally see them during the day.” 

“I don’t want your dog to run out there and get bit.” 

“Thanks.” 

After my neighbor left, I went to the dining room window and peered into the backyard. Sure enough, a huge racoon was sunbathing on our lawn. “Did Felix go outside already?” I asked my wife. 

“He did. Why?” 

“There’s a raccoon in our yard. Check him for bites.” 

An examination of the dog revealed no injuries, so I went upstairs, changed into some clothes and went into the backyard. The racoon got up when he saw me and scuttled away, limping on one paw. Something was wrong with this critter. I pulled my cell phone out of my pocket and called the police.

“Is it rabid?” my wife asked from the back porch. 

“I don’t know.” 

When the policeman arrived, he said the animal was either injured or sick and got a hook snare out of his cruiser to grab him and take him to animal control but, when he approached, the raccoon clambered up a tree.

“He can’t be that hurt if he can climb up a tree,” the cop, said. 

“Maybe he’ll just go away if we leave him alone,” I said. 

“Let me call Nancy,” he said, referring to our animal control officer. “She’ll know what to do.” 

Talking to us on speakerphone, Nancy said the symptoms we described didn’t sound like rabies and concurred with my assessment to just leave it alone. “Let nature take its course,” she said. Then the cop left, and I told my wife not to let our dog or daughter into the backyard. 

“He’s so cute,” my daughter cooed from the window. “Can we keep it?” 

“It’s a wild animal,” I said. “Not a pet. Hopefully he’ll just go away.” 

“I’m going to call it Bandit,” Natalie said. “He’s our friend now.” Just great. 

After stowing the breakfast dishes into the dishwasher, we all took showers, got dressed and then went about our day. When we returned from a nice late lunch at three, I went to the backyard to check on our uninvited guest. He was still there, sleeping on our compost heap, his chest heaving rapidly. Sighing, I knew this was going to end badly.

“Is Bandit still there?” Natalie asked. 

“He’s taking a nap,” I lied.  

While I don’t live in the wilderness, I’m far enough into the countryside to have dealt with all manner of creatures great and small. Bears have traipsed down my street, deer have treated my wife’s flower bed life a buffet, my dog’s been sprayed by skunks, possum have knocked over my garbage cans, hawks have perched on the massive maple tree in my front yard and once, when I was on my porch writing late at night, I looked up to find a coyote staring straight at me. Seeing dead critters littering the road is an almost daily event. A few months earlier, a deer got hit by a car down the street from my house and the cops had to shoot it. When the shot rang out, I winced and remembered life’s very cruel sometimes. 

I tried to ignore the raccoon, but my wife was obsessed with it, always looking out the window to check on him. Then, around five o’clock, Annie called out from the front porch. “There’s something really wrong with that raccoon.”

“What?” 

“Take a look.” 

I joined my wife on the porch. The racoon had crawled to the side of my house and was lying on its back, its limbs contorted oddly and shaking violently. “It’s having a seizure,” I said. 

“Is it rabies?” 

“Probably.” So, I called the cops again.

“Yeah,” the same cop from earlier said, after he arrived. “I have to shoot it.”

“Oh dear,” I said.

“Can I shoot him on your front lawn? He’s on your footpath and the bullet could ricochet.” 

“Do what you have to do.” 

While the cop got his snare, I went into the house and told Annie what was going on. “Take Natalie upstairs to the back of the house and keep her distracted,” I said. “I don’t want her to see this.” Then I went back outside. By now, small crowd of neighbors had gathered, and I joined them on the other side of the street. “What’s going on?” one of them asked. 

“Cop has to shoot a raccoon.” 

“In your front yard?” 

“He told me that’s the safest place to do it.” 

“Wow.” 

The cop dragged the racoon, who was by this time insensate, onto my front lawn. Then he put earplugs into his ears, drew his weapon, and took careful aim. I covered my ears and closed my eyes. I didn’t want to watch. 

Bang!

After the report faded, I walked on to my lawn and stood next to the cop, his gun still smoking. The racoon was trembling on the ground, a hole from a nine millimeter hollow point in his chest. 

“He’ll go in a minute,” the cop said. “I had to shoot him in the chest because we need to send the head to the lab.” 

“Ugh,” I said, watching the racoon gasp spasmodically as the smell of gunpowder filled the air. After a minute the creature finally lay still. 

“That’s it,” the cop said, holstering his weapon. “I’ll bag him up and take him over to Nancy.” If killing this creature bothered him, he didn’t show it.

“You must have to do this a lot,” I said. 

“This is the third racoon I’ve shot this week.” 

“Third?” 

“We dispatched about twenty this month,” the cop said. “Something’s going around.” 

“The bullet is in the ground I guess.” 

“Oh yeah. It went right through him.”

“Lot of paperwork for this?” 

“No, just a form. One sheet of paper.” Then the cop bagged up the animal and left. When I went back into my house, my daughter was there to greet me. 

“Did the policeman shoot Bandit?” she asked. 

“Yes, dear.”

That’s sad.” 

“He was suffering. It was best thing to do for him.” 

“Yeah,” Natalie said. “A bear could have come along and ate him.” Then she went back to her dolls and seemed to forget about the whole thing. Then Nancy called me on my cell phone and told me to get my dog over to the vet for a rabies booster shot. “He was in the yard with it,” she said. “Can’t be too careful.” I told her we’d make an appointment the next day. 

Back on the front lawn, my wife and I stood over the bloodstained spot where the raccoon met his fate. “That was very sad,” Annie said. 

I shrugged. “Had to be done. It was a danger to everybody.” 

“Did it suffer?” 

“A little bit. He couldn’t shoot it in the head because they need to send it to the lab to test for rabies.” 

“Eeek.” 

“Well,” I said. “Look on the bright side. This will be a Mother’s Day you’ll never forget.”  

The post A Mother’s Day You’ll Never Forget appeared first on Waiter Rant.

Valentine’s Day Eve

“That’ll be two hundred and thirty- five dollars, please,” the clerk said to the man ahead of me.  

“You take Amex?” he asked. 

“Yes, sir.” Then, after computers ascertained the man’s credit worthiness, the clerk handed him a bag filled with enough candy to put a Cape Buffalo into a diabetic coma. 

“Happy Valentine’s Day, sir,” the clerk chirped merrily. “Who’s next?” 

“That would be me,” I said. 

“What can I get you?” 

“Just a small box of candy.” 

“What would you like?” 

I was in a large candy store in the center of town and, judging from the throngs of people queued up to buy chocolates for their sweethearts, I figured the eve of the annual Cupidinal bacchanal was the confectioner’s version of Mother’s Day – making me wonder if some of the staff was hitting the sauce like I used to on that Yom Kippur for guilty children. I figured twenty brandy cordials would probably do the trick.  

“One milk chocolate raspberry truffle, please,” I said, pointing to the treats behind the display case. “A milk chocolate Irish crème, a milk chocolate caramel, a milk chocolate salted caramel and a milk chocolate banana crème.” 

“Just five, sir?” 

“That’ll be enough,” I said. “My wife doesn’t eat a lot of candy. Just make sure none of its dark chocolate. She can’t stand the stuff.”

“No problem, sir.” 

You might be thinking I’m a considerate husband by making sure my wife got candy she liked, but you would be wrong. I couldn’t remember if she preferred milk chocolate or dark and had to text her sister to find out. And I’ve been married to Annie for almost ten years. 

“Milk chocolate!”  her sister texted back. “I like dark chocolate.” I only hope my sister-in-law’s boyfriend in more on the ball than I am. 

“Mommy,” a little boy screeched. “I want some candy!” 

“You’ll ruin your dinner,” his harried mother replied.

“But it’s my candy!” 

“Not until tomorrow.” 

The mother was young, attractive and, judging from her tight fitting athletic attire, a devotee of physical fitness. I mentally wagered she’d probably go home and cook a kale and quinoa casserole with vegan cheese for her family. If I was that kid, I’d probably demand candy as an amuse-bouche too. Yeah, I’m probably being a tad judgmental, but you should see all the Girl Scout cookies mothers donate to my food pantry after the annual Thin Mint workplace shakedown. “I’ll buy them,” one told me. “But I sure as hell won’t eat them.” 

“Will that be all, sir?” the clerk said, handing me a small box tied with a bow. 

“And this,” I said, putting two heart shaped boxes on the counter. The big one was for my daughter, and the small one was for Natalie to give to my wife. 

“That’ll be $39.95.” Ouch. Love can be expensive. 

After the computer terminal declared me momentarily solvent, I took my bag of goodies and headed out the door, valiantly resisting the urge to sneak a peek at the fit mom’s spandex covered derriere. That would be gauche at my age. Or would it be louche? Probably both. Crossing the street, I headed into the sundry shop to buy two Valentine’s Day cards and a lottery scratch off for my wife. Another twenty bucks consumed by that cherub from Madison Avenue hell. Then I went to pick up my daughter at her after school program. 

“Will I get a heart shaped balloon tomorrow?” Natalie asked as soon as she got in the car. 

“Is that a thing?” 

“You get me one every year.”

“Maybe you’ll get something else instead.” 

“Like what?” 

“I dunno. Wait until tomorrow.” 

“Will you buy me candy?” 

“When have you ever not gotten candy on Valentine’s Day?” 

“Just checking.” I hope my daughter’s future boyfriend knows what he’s in for. 

After Natalie belted herself in, I drove to a drugstore so she could pick out a card for her mom. Since we’re babysitting my other sisters-in-law’s twelve year old pug, she picked out a card featuring such a dog saying, “Pugs and Kisses!” as well as playing a canine barking out a song when you pushed a button. Eight bucks. And the balloon my daughter grabbed? Another five. 

Arriving home, I dispatched Natalie to do her homework, cracked open a beer, and started making dinner – Brodo di Pollo con Pastina. Chicken soup. After putting two chicken breasts into a pot to boil, I chopped up celery, carrots, onions and garlic, dumped them in after the chicken had cooked for ten minutes and then added salt, pepper, garlic powder and olive oil. Thirty minutes later I took out the chicken, shredded it, added pastina to the broth, adjusted the seasonings, put the chicken back in with half a cup of parsley and let everything to simmer a bit more. Then I made a salad and waited for my wife to come home. 

“Smells good, honey,” she said as I sprinkled Parmesan on top of her soup.

“And it cost like nothing to make,” I said. “We had all the ingredients in the house.” After dropping two hundred bucks on our bar side Pre-Valentine’s dinner Saturday night, I figured economizing was in order – or those computers might turn on me. Besides, nothing says love like a home cooked meal, other than candy, balloons, overpriced cards and lotto tickets that is. 

Most people don’t know Valentine’s Day is meant to honor a saint who chose to be beheaded rather than renounce his Christian faith. But advertisers have done a bang up job making men fear the same fate – or worse – will befall them if they don’t pony up during this commercially mandated celebration of the heart. Blue balling it on the couch isn’t any guy’s idea of a good time. But days like this remind me how grateful I am to no longer be in the restaurant business – foisting overpriced special menus on high strung couples in an overbooked bistro while pasting on a fake smile as I hoovered up their money. For me, Valentine’s Day was a strictly mercenary affair. 

Luckily for me, my wife feels the same way and has always been content with small tokens of affection on Valentine’s Day. But when I had a little girl, my attitude toward the holiday softened a bit. It is important for little girls to get candy and sweet nothings from their fathers when Cupid arrives – and vital they see their mothers honored as well. It teaches daughters that they deserved to be treated right by the men in their lives -whether by their dad or some bonehead pipsqueak named Brandon, Tyler, Caleb, or whatever names parents have given my daughter’s future suitors. But whoever they are, they’d better be nice to Natalie. 

Or else I’ll make them wonder if her crazy old man really does have several hitchhikers buried in his backyard and isn’t afraid to go back to prison.

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Eating At The Bar

“The parking lot is packed,” my wife, said. “It doesn’t look good.” 

“I’ll go inside and see,” I said. “You never know.” 

“I’ll wait out here.” 

Upon entering the restaurant, I went up to the hostess, “I know it’s a longshot.  But do have a table for two?” 

The hostess smiled winsomely and ran her finger down the reservation book. Judging from the packed tables I could see from my perch, I figured we were probably out of luck – but that’s what you get when you walk into a popular restaurant on Saturday night without a reservation. 

As the hostess’ winsomeness began to increase exponentially, I looked over at the bar and saw four open stools, which surprised me.  Normally they’re all taken at that hour 

“Any problem with eating at the bar?” I asked. 

“No, sir.” 

“We’ll sit there. Thank you.” 

Pivoting to my left, I hopped onto a stool and motioned the barman over. “A Chopin martini, please. Dirty. Olives. Up.” 

“Right away, sir.” 

“And two menus, please. We’ll be having dinner.” Then I fished my phone out of my blazer and texted my wife. I got us seats at the bar.

The bar?

I already ordered a drink. Come on in.

I have to find a parking spot.

My wife, for reasons I can’t fathom, doesn’t like eating at a bar. I have no problem with it. Besides, if we went to another restaurant, we’d probably run into the same paucity of open tables and fritter away the precious hours of our “date night.” Ordering a drink without her was my way of sealing the deal. 

“Your martini, sir,” the barman said, depositing my alcoholic treat in front of me. Taking a sip, I smiled. Cold, bracing and properly made, I enjoyed the taste of 80 proof ethanol on my tounge and began to relax. Then I felt a tap on my shoulder. 

“Excuse me,” a woman wearing a fur wrap said anxiously. “Is this seat taken?’ 

“I’m holding it for my wife. She’s parking the car.” 

“Oh.” 

“Sorry.” 

Now, I’ll admit I was being a bit of a dick. Not wanting to sit at the very end of the bar and get clipped by the waiters’ fetching drinks, I took the stools in the middle, leaving one stool open on either side. If the staff had asked me to move over, I would have, but no one asked. 

My wife walked in, and I waved her over. “I know you’re not a fan of eating at the bar,” I said.  “But humor me tonight.” 

“No argument from me,” she said. “I got the last parking spot.” Then, after she ordered a margarita, we began to peruse the menu. Before Annie’s drink was done being shaken, however, two singles snagged the stools next to us. I also noticed a throng of people were now queued up in front of the hostess stand. 

“Excuse me,” a testy man said to the hostess. “But where can I park my car?” 

“In the lot, sir?” 

“There’s no spots. And I have a reservation!” 

As the manager moved into defuse the situation, I turned to Annie and said, “We got here in the nick of time.” 

“This place filled up quick.” 

Located in a repurposed train station in the wealthy town next to mine, the restaurant is very popular with the locals. Expensive with excellent food and service, it’s a once or twice a year splurge for my wife and I. But judging from the huffing and puffing from the aggrieved diners waiting for tables and looking forlornly at the packed bar, I got the sense they thought this was their private dining room. 

“Do you remember the asshole in the Porsche the last time we came here?” I asked Annie.

“You scared him to death.” 

Last year, my wife and I were heading into the restaurant’s parking lot when a Porsche 911 cut me off, forcing me to slam on the brakes. Aggravated, I watched the driver, a tanned fiftyish man with a sweater draped over his shoulders, get out of his car and brush something off the hood. I also noticed he’d parked outside lines, taking up extra space to discourage anyone from parking next to his fine German ride. So, being me, I pulled my fine Japanese ride as close to his Porsche as possible. Stunned, the man watched as I opened my door micromillimeters from his car’s precious bodywork and gingerly slipped out. 

“Evening,” I said to him as we walked toward the restaurant. “Nice car.” Of course, the man said nothing, but decided to get into a staring contest with me. Mistake. People have asked me to show them my thousand yard stare in the past, but it’s not something I can turn on and off on command; it only happens when circumstances align to produce it. This was one of those times. So, I dumped a  “I might look like a normal guy, but I could have several hitchhikers buried in my back yard, an unhealthy gun fetish, hate Germans, and haven’t taken my court mandated medication in a month so why take the chance?” energy into the man’s ocular nerve and smiled. The man, of course, said nothing, but I so unnerved him that he shot furtive looks my way the rest of the night. 

“A happy memory,” I said, sipping my drink. “A happy memory.” Then we ordered – a wedge salad to share, blackened tuna for me and shrimp and pasta dish in a horseradish sauce for my wife. Then, as we were eating our entrees, the owner stopped by to ask how everything was. 

“Excellent as always,” I said. 

“Thank you for being understanding and sitting at the bar,” he said. “It was a ninety minute wait for a table.” 

“The best seat in the house is the one you’re in. Nice to see you’re so busy.” 

“Nice to see you again, sir.” We come here one or two times a year, but this guy remembered my face. Classy.  Then again, he probably buys Prozac in bulk from Costco to put up with patrons like Porsche guy. 

As we finished our food, I looked at the other customers eating at the bar. Everyone seemed happy, especially the guy on my right.  After downing two cocktails, he was already halfway through an expensive bottle of Pinot Noir and feeling no pain. Then again, neither was I. For me, a martini and a class of Sauvignon Blanc is overdoing it these days. And, although I wouldn’t have minded a digestif, we ordered one dessert to share instead – a blueberry cobbler. 

“It’s tasty,” I said, after taking a forkful. “But it doesn’t taste like blueberry.” 

“Something’s not right, “Annie said. 

“Oh no!” the bartender said. “You got the wrong thing!” 

“What is it?” I asked. 

“It’s the mushroom puff pastry!” 

“With ice cream and crème fraiche?” 

“The kitchen made a mistake,” he said, whisking it away. Then, when he returned, he put what looked like the exact same thing in front of us. “Sorry about that, sir.” 

After cutting the pastry open to ascertain its blueberry bond fides, I said. “No worries. They look very similar.” But truth be told, I would’ve eaten the mushroom cobbler and ice cream anyway, but I doubt Porsche guy would have been as forgiving. 

Dessert done and check paid, I whispered in Annie’s ear. “Five seconds until someone hops into our seats.” 

“They won’t have a chance to get cold,” Annie said. Sure enough, a couple pounced on them the moment our feet slid off the bar rail. Like I said, the place was busy. 

Walking to the car, I surveyed the expensive automobiles in the parking lot which made my Toyota look positively plebian. Oh well, at least my car insurance isn’t as high. Then, nestled amidst the BMW’s and Mercedes’ I spied a Porsche 911. Could it be the same guy? I toyed with the idea of returning to the dining room to see if it was. Hey buddy. I’m back!” No, that would be immature, impolite, and borderline nuts. 

But I am sometimes all those things. 

The post Eating At The Bar appeared first on Waiter Rant.

No Rush

“Daddy,” my daughter asked me, yet again, from the backseat of the car, “I want to talk about that thing.” 

“It’s called puberty, Natalie,” I said. “You can say the word.” 

“It’s a funny word.” 

“It’s from a Latin word. They all sound funny. But lots of medical stuff is in Latin.” 

“So will they talk about that in school?” 

“At some point,” I said. “Probably when you’re a bit older.”

“I don’t want the boys to be there.” 

“Why not?” 

“That stuff’s for girls.” 

“Boys go through puberty too. And it’s important they learn how it affects girls too.” 

“When I talk to you about this stuff,” Natalie said. “It’s not weird. But when other people talk to me about it, it’s weird.”  

“You can ask Mommy and me about this stuff anytime you want to,” I said. “We’ll tell you what you need to know.” 

No one ever talked to me about puberty when I was growing up. My introduction to sexual maturity was my eight grade teachers telling my class how we were all starting to stink and to use deodorant. Oh, and getting slapped upside the head for looking down Leigh-Ann Stakowski’s blouse to admire her newly developed bosom. But I decided long ago to always answer Natalie’s questions about puberty and sex as honestly and appropriately as I could. I never want my daughter to feel ashamed about growing up. 

“So,” Natalie said. “Does getting your period hurt?” 

“It can be uncomfortable,” I said. “There can be muscle cramps and stuff. Sometimes women have to take a Tylenol. But it varies from woman to woman.” 

“How long does it last?” 

 “A week usually.” 

“A week?” Natalie shrieked. 

“For some women it’s shorter.”

“When will I get my period?” 

“I don’t know. Your cousin got hers at eleven. Sometimes it happens when you twelve or thirteen. Everybody’s different.” 

“I hope I get mine when I’m twelve.” 

“Listen,” I said. “It’ll happen when it happens. When you’re in middle school you’ll see boys and girls who are starting to look like men and women and boys and girls who still look like they’re still little kids in the same class. People grow up at different rates. It’s normal.” As I remember, Leigh-Ann was an early developer. 

“What if it happens when I’m in school?” Natalie said. 

“Well,” I said. “You just ask the teacher to be excused and go to the nurse. She’ll have stuff to help you.” 

“What kind of stuff?” Oh boy. 

“She’ll have some pads to help keep the blood from messing up your clothes.” 

“What if I’m wearing white pants?” Wow. My daughter’s wargaming her menarche out already. 

‘The mommy or daddy will bring you another pair of pants. Don’t worry about it. Accidents happen. And when you talk to your mom and the other girls who’ve gone through it, they’ll tell you all the tips and tricks how to deal with it.” Sisterhood is powerful. 

“Daddy?” 

“Yes dear.” 

“When can I have a boyfriend?” 

“That usually starts happening when your fifteen or sixteen.”

“When did you first go on a date?” 

“Fifteen,” I said. “I took a girl to the movies.” My dad drove us there and the girl’s father was waiting for us the moment we got out – with what I thought was a homicidal gleam in his eye.

“What movie did you see?” 

“The Right Stuff. A movie about astronauts.” 

“Did she want to see that?” 

“I honestly don’t know.” 

“You should have asked her what she wanted to see.” 

“Live and learn, kid.” 

So,” Natalie said. “Will I get hair under my arms?” 

“Yep.” 

“Gross.” 

“Most women shave it off.” 

“Does that hurt?”

“Not if you do it right. Mommy will show you how.  Men shave their faces and women shave their legs, it’s all part of the deal.”

“You have hair on your ears.” 

“That didn’t happen until I was forty. Men get hair in weird places when they get older.”  

“Daddy?” 

“Yes, dear.” 

“When can I walk to Starbucks with my friends?’ 

“Probably in middle school,” I said. “It’s on your way home.”

“I see all the older kids there. And at Playa Bowl.” 

“Those places are very busy at 3:30.” 

“So will I get a phone when I’m in middle school?” 

I grunted. “We’ll see.” 

When we got home, I made Natalie a snack and she turned on the tv to watch Barbie and “decompress” from her “tough day.” As I watched her drink her milk and nibble on a cookie I realized my daughter was still very much a little girl.  She still sleeps in a kiddie bed with a menagerie of stuffed animals and, although she asserts her burgeoning independence every day, she still needs me to tuck her in every night with a kiss and a cuddle.  I will miss that when it’s gone, big time. ‘Don’t be in such a rush to grow up, Natalie,” I said to myself. “You’re only a little kid once.” 

Besides, I only have one bathroom in my house. 

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