The restaurant is like all the other places we go to in the city: dark, lush, quietly electric, expensive. I used to fight the urge to faint every time I sat down to order, anything, everything, it was all too much, so much, so unnecessary; now I walk in, know to greet the hostess, know to check my coat, know to kiss on the cheeks, know to wait for my napkin to be unfolded for me, my fast heart still a catch in my chest, an easy smile to compensate. At best I am ambivalent about these nascent social graces, at worst I am terrified of them, anxious about unintended implications.
They are there, my mother in law and my sister in law, leaning over their blackberries, looking up to say hello. I never know what to wear. I never feel as if I've gotten it right; something is always wrong-- my shoes, my jeans, my bag, my jacket. And I am proud and uncomfortable with this. In order to assimilate there is much to hand over.
I love them each awkwardly and individually but the sum of our parts is often too much when we are together. The table is draped in burlap, the red wine has been poured, the votive lit, the menu--which is the same menu as every other restaurant we tend in New York--considered and the blackberries placed, for the moment, down.
But I have nothing to bring to them. I have nothing to say. They don't want to hear about my life, the hospital, school. We each ask each other the requisite pleasantries, the necessary questions. How are the kids? Fine. How was your test? Fine. How was your day? Miserable. They ease into their lives in spoken format, what's to be done about the markets, are you still renting the summer house in Jackson, who's buying what pieces of art and from whom and for how much and from which dealers. The mortgage broker my sister in law referred messed up a big appointment, she was pissed and shot him a nasty email, duly noting that she was "happy" she hadn't referred him to one of her clients. Power. Money. Leverage.
I sat and watched and listened, as I so often do, surprised by my loneliness, alarmed at what comes to my mind. This is my family now. These women in Prada. Across the table, so far away. I know better. I know I should be the one to rise above this. To be grateful. To remember that my dinner costs more than I used to make an hour; to breathe; to be present and without judgement.
In this space, with the benefit of draft and edit, there are times when my internal intentions come out complete, in tact and in their entirety. It is rarely ever like that in my head. Often and in the moment I look at them and see nothing but distance and difference, allocating it to the tilt and shift of the life they live in, pushing it off of my skin to theirs. But when I am alone or reflecting I always return to me: what I could have said or done to make it easier to find connection, to make it easier to feel interesting, interested, relevant, loved.
They don't ask, but I don't push. They don't know the name of the hospital I work at (although they do know that it is not an Important Hospital and so isn't worth mentioning), don't know that there are times when I come home and sit on the cool tiles of my bathroom, clutch my shoulders and sob. They are unaware that the man who I sat with and read excerpts of Robert Kennedy's biography last week died alone in a hospital bed, his loose red beanie still lopsided on his head. They don't ask so I don't tell them that I clung to the metal rails of the supply room for five full minutes just to stay upright because this world is beautiful and cruel and we are only given so much of it. They don't want to hear about it. My sister in law won't take her kids to see Rent. She thinks it is Too Much. They don't need to Know That. I am thinking, I will tell my kids everything that I know how to. And when I cannot use words, then I will show them. I think about my mom, who bought me The Tenth Good Thing About Barney after our first dog died, who sat there with me while I ran overboard with wet and easy tears. She held my hand while I inspected the remains of our dead bunny, surprising each of us early one morning.
But they will tell me, what do I know? They will tell me, just wait, you'll see. When you have kids everything changes. They are unintentionally assuming that the miracle of childbirth will turn me into a different person. They would look at me with shock and disapproval, like when I reach for the bread, if they really knew what was inside of me.
