Eating Smutch*

Our first beer comes with a little dish of peanuts and another of potato chips. The chips twang stale, edible but something just not fresh and crisp (as crisps should!); the peanuts taste off.

A small bowl of olives come with our second beer. The olives remind me of insecticide; and the beer doesn't taste quite right either. I pause to wonder if there is something wrong with me.

You could be sick. Right? An impaired sense of taste. Could mean something.

The Man has been tasting the peanuts, chips and olives whilst he chats on the mobile with an ex-colleague-cum-friend who needs some professional advice. I have a book with me. I read it in starts.

And listen to one half of The Man's conversation in fits.

And wonder if The Man doesn't taste something tawdry in our culinary accoutrements.

I look at The Man, at the profile as familiar as my little toe, and find myself looking at him objectively. He is a beautiful colour. Some compare his particular shade of brown to some kind of coffee drink. I never felt this was quite right. Recently, the very same friend to whom My Man now speaks on the phone, commented on the golden glow that lay below My Man's brown. It's true: My Man is more hot tea with honey than café con leche.

My Man laughs at something the observant friend has said. His eyes crinkle when he laughs. He laughs easily, and from the gut.

I look at him from outside his world. I appraise him.

This Man is an exceptional man. He is so fucking selfless.

He doles out sound professional advice and with good humour. When he hangs up, I comment on the staleness of the crisps, oddly wrong peanuts, and the clinical olives. He nods.

"You're right."

As he puts another crisp in his mouth.

*It's a word! Look it up.

Man & Woman Without Arms

When I pass The Man Without Arms, I think, "It's been a long time since I've seen the man without arms."

He is in his normal spot, on his knees and up against the sliver of wall that separates the mobile phone kiosk from the girl's clothing boutique. For the first time, I notice there is a hook or nob of some sort on the wall just behind his neck, and upon the hook or nob or whatever it is, there is slung a man-bag. All I see is the strap, a black strap pretending to be leather, but probably plastic. Suddenly, my imagination takes over and I picture the Man Without Arms earlier in the day preparing for a day of alms-asking: his legs are fine so he walks among the crowd unnoticed. His pace is clipped. The black, plastic bag in which he carries the tricks of his trade is slung across his chest. Only if you look carefully will you realise there are no arms protruding from the short sleeves of his red polo. The mental images I'm following cease when he gets to his sliver of pavement where he will dexterously use his toes to fold the towel on which he will kneel; he will take out a small bowel of woven straw, which he will place at his knees. He will remove his black man-bag from across his chest and hang it on the nob behind where he will spend his day kneeling. I can't imagine any of this; simple things that must be so hard to do without arms.

Instead of visualizing The Man Without Arms readying himself for work, my mind rushes me back to a movie I was shown in 4th grade homeroom sometime around 1977 or 78.

A woman without arms hums to herself as she washes a clump of green grapes with her feet in the kitchen sink. A man's voice - the narrator of the film - explains how the woman without arms leads a perfectly normal life. The grapes are for the lunch she is preparing for her two children, both of whom have arms. Later, the film shows the woman with no arms putting foot lotion onto her feet before sliding into bed with her perfectly normal, husband who is very happy to come home to his armless wife because she doesn't fail to have dinner in the oven and a drink waiting for when the master of the house comes home.

I remember the day we were shown this film, we had a substitute teacher. I remember this precisely: I was taking notes in a little flip open notebook with a Panda eating bamboo on the front cover. I remember the sub, because she took my notebook away.

I was taking notes so that I wouldn't forget the message(s) of the film: people without arms can do anything other people can do; people without arms want to be treated just like anyone else; when you meet a person without arms, you should not reach out to shake their hand, but if you do, you shouldn't make a big deal out of it; you should brush it off like a joke and move on to other topics of conversation.

Ok, I admit, I don't remember the precise content of my note-taking, but I was taking notes - in all capitals ... I think it was the first time I realised YOU COULD WRITE IN ALL CAPS AND I LOST MYSELF IN A WEIRD ENJOYMENT OF CREATING A LIST OF WHAT YOU SHOULD AND SHOULD NOT DO WHEN MEETING A PERSON WITHOUT ARMS BY WRITING IN ALL CAPS. I kind of fell in love with my own all-cap handwriting that day.

The substitute teacher, however, didn't appreciate the extent of my dorkiness and once she spied me scrawling away in my pocket-sized notebook, she swooped down and took it away. I tried to protest but she shooshed at me, and I was a bit afraid that I would get in trouble for writing in ALL CAPS.

The substitute teacher sheepishly snuck up behind me a few minutes later.

"I'm sorry," she might have patted my head, "I didn't realise you were taking notes. Good girl."

I think about the woman with no arms in that movie shot so long ago. I wonder if she is still alive. I wonder if it isn't easier to be a woman with no arms because you don't have to worry about going out into the world and making money. All you have to do is find a husband who only cares about coming home to a drink and a dinner in the oven. I'm sure the Man without Arms would rather be at home washing grapes with his feet in the kitchen sink.

I chastise myself for my sexist thought. I am astounded by the power of the Man without Arms to dredge up long latent memories.

Wicker versus Plastic

The wicker I'm sitting on isn't really wicker at all. It's plastic. The wood too. The wood frames around which the "wicker" weaves itself in order to give my butt support are plastic too. Plastic which has been treated to look like wood; but they aren't fooling anyone. Even The Dog knows the chair's wooden frame is plastic.

I don't hate these faux-wicker chairs, but I much prefer the straight-backed metal, ones at the terraza across the street.

They are so much more authentic.

The chairs at the terraza across the street make me think of Ernest Hemingway and Buñuel and the Madrid of tertulias and history, in general. I feel like I should be in black and white at the terraza across the street.

Then why aren't you there now?

I really like the fact that they give me crisps with my beer at the faux-wicker terraza. At the historic-feeling terraza across the road, they don't give you any treats with your beer.

And, they serve it in the bottle. You have to pour it yourself..

I like the beer here at the faux-wicker place, and the solid cylindrical glasses in which they serve it. It must be on tap. I remember when I was a young girl, my father would ask what beers they had on tap. I didn't understand the question at the time. Now I appreciate a beer on tap rather than in a bottle (or worse: a can!).

But isn't a keg just a big can?

I have compromised history for a little bowl of potato chips. At least I'm not sitting in the red, plastic chairs with 'Coca~Cola' embossed on the back.