Love

Since I've recently become single, I find myself going places and doing things that I normally wouldn't do all in the name of meeting women. This usually means after a long tiring day of work I'll force myself to visit a bar or a party that I normally wouldn't go to. The most recent of these events was when my work hosted a networking event called "Girls in Tech." As you might have guessed, it's for women in the tech industry.

When I first heard we were hosting this event my first thought was "Oh God, am I going to have to help set it up?" Then, I decided that I wasn't going to go until I found out two things. The first was the promise of free alcohol and the second was that there would be many girls, in tech. Now I'm in the tech industry so I figured this would be a gold mine to use my newly realized skills of seduction.  I could say things like "so, um, are you in the tech industry?" and "sooo, what's the deal with dialup? Am I right?"

The night came and after about 15 minutes they ran out of alcohol... This should never happen at a networking event. Liquor is the key that opens the door to networking. After talking to a few women – I was really happy because I got all their numbers and they seemed interested in me. Then it dawned on me that, of course, they were friendly and gave me their numbers, this is a networking event. After realizing this sad truth I was ready to leave but then a co-worker ran inside and said, "There's a taco truck outside bringing in food!"

I considered myself a food lover: a zealous, open-minded, and studious consumer of food.  My tastes ran the gamut from Chex Mix to Chez Panisse, and I felt this to be charmingly, almost wittily, indiscriminate of me.  I read cookbooks, restaurant reviews, and food writing.  I cooked.  I baked.  I ate out.  I would have, without hesitation, claimed to be well versed, at the top of my game even, in the Art of Eating. 

I was, needless to say, a recent college graduate and an unfounded know-it-all.  I look back on those days with an indulgent fondness for my younger self, and her survey-class approach to eating.  There she is, I think in my memory, burning garlic and liking it.   I smile, knowing that soon enough she will be introduced to someone so enamored of food that in his presence one begins to question their own passion for almost anything else.  To my student’s eye, meeting Ryan was like being introduced to Edward Said after a steady diet of Cliffs Notes: there is, after all, much more to be found in the details.

Once upon a time, when my future husband and I had just started dating, he called me one Saturday morning to see what I was up to. I was in the car with my friend Phoebe and a trunk full of laundry.

“We’re going to Michael Green’s for breakfast,” I said. I had him on my Reagan-era car phone, which had a curly cord and a speakerphone, which may as well have been a tin can attached to a length of string.

Peter thought about this for a moment. “Is that a restaurant or a person’s house?” he asked.

Bettie One sang like a bird and dressed like a pirate and sent my libido into overdrive. She was an intoxicating beauty with a multitude of talent. But she didn’t have a talent for food presentation.

One dinner in particular stands out. Maybe “stands out” is the wrong way to put it. “Haunts me” is more like it.