Loose Leaf Thoughts: Bound

What caught me were his arms
Strong.
Safe.
Loving.
Arms.
ch arm ing me with his crows’ feet smiles, perched on his perfect face
dis arm ing me with his laid back love, laying big in little—reversible spoons
w arm ing me with his starlit eyes, drawing my sight to the light of them—grounding me in the depth of their earthly love and freeing me to their universal wonder
What caught me were his arms
Strong.
Safe.
Loving.
Arms.

Beauty is in the eye of the storm.

I work at a restaurant,

as a hostess,

in a tourist town (maybe THE tourist town),

right near the entrance from the parking garage/taxi drop-off.

I hear the same questions every day:

“Where’s the bathroom?” 

Left at the waterfall.

“Why’s that statue’s head cut off?”

So you’ll ask me about it and I’ll try to sell you a bottle of vodka. Gotcha.

“You’re not busy. I don’t need a reservation, do I?”

No, but now I’m seating you next to the busser station for being presumptuous. I hope the constant banging of dishes and clanging of silverware is pleasant to you. Sorry, that quiet booth over there is for reservations only.

“Do you have room for two?”

For dinner or drinks? (Because the servers will tar and feather me if you don’t spend at least $100 at their table, even though they make four times what I make.)

“Where’s the Events Center?”

(The sign hanging not ten feet away reads “Events Center” with a simple triangular arrow pointing in the direction I tell them.) Just around to the right. 

“The right?” 

No. Left. I just had to have you ask one more time.

“Didn’t this used to be Rum Jungle?”

No. You were too drunk to remember, but that was next door in that now empty location. See that giant headless statue next to me that most people find fascinating and impossible to forget? You forgot it. You were drunk and can’t remember that the statue existed those eight years ago when you thought you were cool, drinking at Rum Jungle NEXT DOOR. Meaning, we were coexisting with Rum Jungle and are thus NOT THE OLD RUM JUNGLE LOCATION.

“Is the food any good?”

As a matter of fact, no? What an asinine thing to say. No. Go to McDonald’s. Ask them. You don’t belong in my fine dining establishment with those dumbass thoughts in your head that tell you that that’s even going to be a productive question to ask a hostess, much less any employee. Ever.

“Why don’t you have a bathroom inside your restaurant?”

Because when I built this restaurant, I said to myself, “Self, I want to get yelled at by people who have to pee. I want them to have to pee so badly that they insist on getting upset with me about my lack of bathroom planning and ask me why I don’t have a bathroom. Perhaps, they will pee themselves during their ridiculous question to me, the hostess, about my horrible potty planning. Then, and only then, will my life be complete.”

“Where is ___________?”

It’s over there.

“Is it far?”

If it is, would you not go? I’d love to talk to you more about things that don’t matter.

Now, you may think this gets old, and it does. Quickly. I’ve only been working here for about three months and I have these thoughts every shift. But one day, I was cleaning menus and I had an epiphany. Some slob had somehow sprayed a page with what looked like spinach. I thought, “My God. What a horrible, inconsiderate thing to do. I would never do something like that.” And then it dawned on me. We had had about 100 diners that evening and 99 of them would never do a thing like that. I was awestruck. I had been looking at this all wrong.

For every disgusting menu, there are 50 that are spotless.

For every horribly stupid question, there are hundreds of intelligent people figuring out the answers on their own.

For every arrogant, entitled asshole who refuses to sit anywhere but a booth for six with a party of two, there are scores of happy, smiling people celebrating love, life, and satiated appetites with me every night.

I love my job. I realized there that I am an optimist and that for every hopeless tourist who thinks the parking garage is where the Michael Jackson tribute show is (and there are always taxis parked outside the doors, headlights glaring down our corridor), there will be a hundred people who think, “I need to find a cab,” look right, and think, “Found it.”

Dear Netflix,
Thank you for reminding me how much I love Reality Bites. Keep up the good work.

Sincerely,
Alana

What if I just realized—after four years of college—that I’m not loving what I do?

What if I just found out that I’m not living my life the way I intended to?

Philosophy: do what you love.
Past Action: do what you have to fight hardest for.
Epiphany:  I’m a lover, not a fighter.
Goal: do what you love.