Let Them Eat Bagels
On a lucid Saturday morning, Scott and I set out for a day of cultural edification. Committed to a squeaky-clean January, free of the vices of drink, smoke, and dessert, we find ourselves with much time and energy on our hands. The same is true for my pal Frances and her beloved Chad, with whom we ate sushi and went to the movies on Friday. With the sludge of substances rinsed away, Frances was planning on attending an all-night philosophy party at the public library (where I’m sure she will make fast friends with the Chomsky-quoting, stained-canvas-bag-laden, deliverers-of-lectures-during-Q&A-periods-of-readings fellows), and Chad was scheduled to go surfing in the Atlantic Ocean at 9am on a day where the mercury was set to graze 25 F. How long can such ambitions endure?! Only February knows.
So, this is all to say that instead of the typical slothful Saturday, we were dressed (in street clothes!) and out the door by 10 am and off to brunch, a meal I studiously avoid on weekends. But a weekday brunch? That is where a freelancer/adjunct professor’s wealth resides. After arguing about where to eat, I capitulated (because I am merciful and benevolent) to Scott’s preference for Mile End, a petite Montreal-style Jewish deli that affects the appearance of a diner with the pricing of the Four Seasons. I was mid-capitulation on the corner of Atlantic and Hoyt when Scott noticed another pair of humans waiting at the same light. Intuiting their desperation to spend fifteen U.S. dollars on an unremarkable bagel sandwich, Scott urged me to step lively to beat these two to the restaurant.
I was unimpressed with this request. To increase one’s speed to fight for a seat at Mile End is to willingly surrender our humanity, to go skipping docilely toward End Times. To run to try to beat out our fellow citizens, to move with the mindset that there are but two seats left in all the world is an impoverished attitude, and I refuse to succumb. Plus, did we even know for fact they were en route to the same spot as us, and that they would supplant us in line? I maintained my typical slow saunter. But the lady in the opposing couple, perhaps having heard us, or having seen Scott clasp my mitten to drag me, picked up her pace, nay, broke into a JOG and passed us in the crosswalk! We trailed them closely afoot, though they reached the entrance first.
Dear reader, they took the last two seats.
Beyond Scott’s righteousness, I was horrified. How dare one violate what little dignity is left in this brokedown city and RUN to brunch?! I find this behavior utterly Hobbesian, and I maintain that those who refuse to run will come out victorious (I’ll note here that we ended up at French Louie, my top draft pick, so victory really was mine). We spent much of our meal debriefing over a hamburger this shocking turn of events. When all other manner of vice is off the table, one resorts to eating red meat in the morning.
I delivered a speech about propriety, something to the effect of: We will not sink to the barbarous levels of this coarse person! She clearly needed that bagel sandwich more than us! (And, please, who am I kidding, I have for sure stampeded for food in my life. Better she enjoys it with a side of Pedialyte.) Let her take the lead! We will maintain our civility and walk at an orderly pace and not sandbag our brethren!
So this week I recommend: after you!
Perhaps it’s a self-serving apology for how slow I can be. But this city is crowded AF and whenever I reach deep into the bowels of my soul to extend the tiniest bit of pause rather than giving into the limbic urge TO BE FIRST, I find a nugget of peace. So, retreating a few steps when the Q train finally arrives after its unknown journey through the wilderness. Holding the door for a slow-ass elder just toddling along. Turning on my heel to the dramatically-sighing person behind me at Starbucks and offering my place in line. It’s a tiny kindness to others, yes, but more to oneself, to forego the adrenalin of competition in place of a little bit of spaciousness. I suffer from profound impatience. For many of you, I imagine, this kind of quotidian selflessness is a no-brainer. But for moi it’s a BRAINER in the first degree.
In my first year of living in New York, Brooke and I were meeting up for a movie at Lincoln Plaza. Our adjustment to post-college life was a rough one. We both longed for the days of lots of people around, intellectual stimulation, and a meal plan. We were probably bitching about some manner of this as we walked into a Duane Reade, when a disgruntled gentleman was exiting as we were entering, and saw fit to plow us down rather than wait a hot second.
“AFTER YOU, SIR! I INSIST!” I yelled to his back. I don’t know if he heard me, but Brooke laughed, so I probably said it ten more times. And I’ll say it again, 11 years later! After you! Please, go ahead of me! You are busy and important and have places to be! Take the last two seats, I insist!
Run, peasants! Let them eat bagels!
Bonus recommendation: I have very much been enjoying Floribama Shore, MTV’s reboot of the Jersey Shore franchise (or better yet Geordie Shore, which is Peabody Award-worthy programming and further evidence that even the shittiest Brits are better than us. In one episode Vicky drunkenly slurred the word “tempestuous” to describe a “wicked crazy” (my term) relationship). I recommend Floribama Shore because it legit gives me hope for the future. Nevermind that in episode one Kortni (her parents must’ve been drunk creatives) pees in her roommate’s bed and in episode two urinates in a trash barrel on the beach in broad daylight (though the acrobatics she achieves are quite impressive—she kind of drapes herself across opening and drops her drawers). But the kids really do seem to care about each other. Nilsa is a 23-year-old divorcée with body image issues, one young man openly wept at the accusation that he is disrespectful to women, one kid was homeschooled on a what appears to be a curriculum of weight lifting, and my fave, Aimee, describes herself as a “mermaid princess goddess,” smokes Newports, and prepares a dish she invented called “taco soup.” And they have all come together to have the best summer ever in Panama City Beach, Florida! It’s hard to find hope anywhere these days, let alone on the Redneck Riviera, but these kids are really serving it.