There was an incident today.

Don’t worry. It’s wasn’t the incident to end all incidents, like we’ve talked about.

***************************************************

Rachelle: Are you still on for the Textile Museum at 2:00?

Rachelle: Tetanus?

Rachelle: No

Rachelle: No, I am certain there’s no such thing as a “Tetanus Museum.”

Rachelle: Well, I’m sorry you misunderstood.

Rachelle: But we have passes for the Textile Museum and we agreed to meet there in 30 minutes.

Rachelle: But you were so keen on seeing the Kimono of Itchiku Kobuta! You said that’s what you were going to name your Fantasy baseball team! What happened?

Rachelle: Really, Pickle?

Rachelle: You think it’s cultural appropriation?

Rachelle: And you don’t want to exercise your white privilege by exploiting something that was not created for the white, male gaze?

Rachelle: And in order to achieve that goal you’ve gone to The Keg Mansion, the place where everything is specially made for you, is that right?

Rachelle: Yes, yes, I know you have a gift card.

Rachelle: And yes, I know The Keg is your safe space.

Rachelle: You’ve said it many times.

Rachelle: Will you do me a favour? Just have a look around.

Rachelle: Do you see a bunch of men who more or less look like you, all eating steak and drinking wine?

Rachelle: Yes, or drinking Caesars.

Rachelle: And are they all being served by hot, young women laughing at all the jokes they’re being told through gritted, shoot-me-now teeth?

Rachelle: In the exploitation Olympics, I think that beats going to a fabric museum, don’t you?

Rachelle: Look, do you even know what false equivalency means?.

Rachelle: I thought not.

Rachelle: Oh, I see.

Rachelle: I was all wrong about Madison the server.

Rachelle: She’s different, is she?

Rachelle: Well maybe when she said that she didn’t mean funny ha-ha?

Rachelle: Okay, let’s just never mind.

Rachelle: Are you going to meet me or not?

Rachelle: Oh, your wedge salad just arrived!

Rachelle: Well obviously your hands are tied.

Rachelle: Yes.

Rachelle: That was sarcasm.

Rachelle: Because you’re being a jerk.

Rachelle: Sweet Jesus.

Rachelle: In no way am I discriminating against you for eating meat.

Rachelle: I’m a Social Justice Warrior? I’m not even sure I know what one is.

Rachelle: You’re drunk.

Rachelle: You Keg-Sized your Caesar, didn’t you?

Rachelle: Yes, I am psychic.

Rachelle: I can also detect something slurry and aggressive in all your texts.

Rachelle: It’s like you’re campaigning for something.

Rachelle: Shouting from the podium!

Rachelle: Throwing emoticons everywhere!

Rachelle: Like angry confetti.

Rachelle: Whatever.

Rachelle: Just remember that the doctor said you could only have one drink a day, okay?

Rachelle: No, don’t worry about it. It’s fine.

Rachelle: I’m going to go to the museum then have a power skating session with Pierre.

Rachelle: No, he wasn’t deported.

Rachelle: He was in Costa Rica on a spiritual retreat.

Rachelle: Very tan. And he shaved off his moustache.

Rachelle: I know it’s a dream of yours to one day grow a full beard like Pierre does so effortlessly, but it’s just not your path, Pickle.

Rachelle: Yes, yours is the path of low testosterone and patchy facial hair.

Rachelle: We all have our crosses to bear, dear.

Upstairs at the bar there’s an unrelenting press of people. So many of them. Jostling together excitedly, they’re all hopeful on this festive night out, each one wanting to feel special in some regard, each one waiting for their life to pivot. Unshaven Bros in sports toques and ball caps, beta predators who only move in packs of two and threes, are looking over at a cluster of Friday night women worrying their phones. Men are pushed up against the bar three deep, each one competing for something.

The bartender is at the centre of it all.

Although completely overwhelmed, she’s working calmly through the chaos. Surrounded on all sides by some sort of want, she makes a millions subtle calculations with each one of her actions. Each person is a problem that must be solved, a fire that must be extinguished. Her face determined, she moves fluidly and with purpose, and all the men encircling her at the bar with their steaks and Keg-sized glasses of red wine, are watching.

A man around 60 leans in. Everyone is leaning in, trying to flag her attention. This man, he’s lived his life handsome, and the confident residue of that lingers within him still, “Can I be next?” he asks in a salesman’s voice. The bartender forces a smile and takes his order, and all the other men waiting stiffen a little, jealous.

He is pleased with himself, this man. He feels special.

When she returns, he leans in yet further, “That tattoo on your right forearm, the roman numerals, are they from your favourite Shakespeare passage? Are you an actress?”

It is not clear that she is flattered by this attention, but she gives a partial, evasive answer.

“It’s a date,” she says, giving the man a polite, discouraging smile. Gesturing to how busy she is, she moves to disengage and tend to other preening, signalling men, but this man was not finished. “This is my favourite passage,” he began, and then in his best Shakespearian accent:

“If music be the food of love, play on.

Give me excess of it that, surfeiting,

The appetite may sicken, and so die…”

And she is trapped, so trapped she is almost suspended in air.

Her eyes close for just a moment, as if it is all too much, and then she reanimates herself and begins to applaud robustly, cutting the man’s recitation short. It was as if a battle had been won, and she got to keep the secret of the tattoo– something so important, so crucial to who she wanted to be, that she had it written into her flesh–for herself.

It was a hot night and most people were sitting out on the patio, but we were inside at a booth that had a view overlooking Bloor Street.

As we studied our menus, a bird flew in through the open doors leading to the patio and with a feathery thud, hit the window directly behind our table, and then slid out of sight into a narrow channel that dipped behind the restaurant’s banquettes and between the windows.

The staff seemed indifferent to this small calamity, more concerned with keeping the operation running smoothly than rescuing the tiny bird. For a variety of reasons, our table was incapable of physically rescuing the bird, as well as being unable to persuade anybody else to do what we could not.

The slender alley in which the bird was trapped wasn’t wide enough for it to fully extend it’s wings, but it kept trying. Flapping madly but futilely, it struggled to lift itself out of the mysterious and disorienting circumstance into which it had suddenly arrived. It would rise up, and then just a tiny bit more, almost to the lip of freedom, and then exhausted from the effort, collapse.

There was nothing we could do, and the bird, subject to an indifferent environment it could not comprehend, fought again and again. And throughout the meal we heard the small, determined sounds of struggle, of something almost taking flight and finding the release of infinite horizon.

Glum and distracted, on one of the saddest nights conceivable, we sat there eating amidst the repetition of heroic failure– each one of us not having to work too hard to find a parallel situation in our own lives, each one, rooting like hell for that bird.

When I got into the taxi I was startled by how pleasant it actually was outside. The weather, if I had to describe it, was rather gentle and I was entirely embarrassed to have thought there was some sort of storm thundering around outside.

I told this to the driver, explaining that I was originally from Ottawa where winter was a bare-knuckled punch to the face and there, I wouldn’t have even noticed this little snow shower. He laughed, “Yeah, I know what you mean, man. I’m from Calgary and winter is a different game altogether. I used to be a trucker out there and often when you’re driving, you’re in the wilderness, and when you come across the mountains, well, I tell you, it’s something else. It’s like they have their own weather systems. You’re alone on the road and you feel absolutely tiny before them, and all around you, everywhere you look, just blankets of snow, snow covering everything! I actually found it eerie, and when a storm swept in off one of those mountains, oh boy! Suddenly, and I mean this, you couldn’t see a thing, complete whiteout, and there was nobody there to help you! Just keep your hands on the wheel,  your eyes open, hope there’s no avalanche. It really felt like nature was just going to swallow you up and vanish you from the face of the earth. And keep in mind, I was driving a huge rig, but hell, that was just a toy in comparison. I swear, I never felt so vulnerable or mortal, and after awhile I couldn’t take it, which is why I took up driving a cab. I feel safe in the city, this,” he gestured to the outdoors, “this shit is nothing.”

The bus negotiates the winter night:
a flickering ship in the pine forest
on a road as narrow and deep as a dead canal.

Few passengers: some old, some very young.
If it stopped and switched off its lights
the world would be deleted.

Making the desserts is a beautiful, young woman wearing black leotards. She has a long frizz of hair, part of which is pinched into a bun at the top of her head, the rest loosely knotted by a bandana that looks like she might have been wearing around her neck two years ago when she worked as a camp counselor. She looks shy and not entirely sure of herself yet, but her job is to make things small and beautiful, to suggest a foreign accent through the softness and distance in her eyes.

The waitress is wearing black leotards, too, only she’s sporting denim shorts over top of them. She whirls out of darkness and puts a plate in front of me, her eyes moving through me to some point in the future– another table she has to tend to, the party she’s going to in an hour, the cat she always feeds on her way home…

Robotically, amidst the almost industrial din of downtown cool, she recites the memorized details of my amuse-bouche, as if a guide speaking through a megaphone to faraway tourists on a hot, double-decker bus excursion.

Men with beards drink artisanal beer at the bar.

R: My hockey game just ended and I should be there in about 10!

R: No fights.

R: There are never any fights.

R: Well, thank you, I guess.

R: I appreciate that you think I would be good in fight.

R: It’s one of the nicest things you’ve ever said to me.

R: Very romantic.

R: Oh, you got the best seat in the house!

R: Well done, Pickle!

R: Yes, your charm is considerable.

R: I bet the hostess didn’t stand a chance.

R: Those new sneakers really give you a lot of confidence, don’t they?

R: Imagine how you’d feel if you had a driver’s license and a job, too??

R: You’d be made of confidence! You’d probably take over a country or something!

R: I’m not being sarcastic.

R: I’m being cute, playful and funny.

R: Hockey doesn’t make me mean.

R: Oh, Pickle, you know I love you, and I do appreciate that you got there early and used your charm to get us the best table in the place.

R: Yes, you do have a commanding presence. It’s clear from the way that animals always obey you.

R: Our dog, for instance, she really listens!

R: And remember when the squirrel knocked you over and gave you a bloody nose when it stole a lozenge from you?

R: No? Well, you did hit your head pretty hard, it’s possible you got a concussion.

R: Yes, you just keep up with the online brain games and I’m sure you’ll be fine.

R: I know you skipped grade three, but honey, that was a very, very long time ago.

R: WHAT????

R: REALLY??? HOLY FUCK!!

R: For the love of Christ, DO NOT SAY A WORD TO HIM!!

R: I CANNOT BELIEVE JIM CUDDY IS IN THE RESTAURANT!! OMG!

R: NO!!! Do not tell him that you really admired his work in the Bare Naked Ladies!

R: You know damn well he was in Blue Rodeo.

R: But it’s true, I would be a bare naked lady for him!

R: How does he look?

R: Yes, it is interesting that you got the best seat in the house and not him. HOW DOES HE LOOK?

R: Oh, he’s wearing ugly sneakers, is he?

R: I still love him. I would love him in any weather.

R: Whatever you do, pleasepleaseplease don’t speak to him.

R: Please, promise me that.

R: Look, I’m allowed celebrity crushes.

R: I know you’ve been looking at the nudes of Jennifer Lawrence.

R: I know you say you’d never violate her and that it’s a sex crime to look at stolen photos, but your Internet history tells a different story.

R: Look, let’s cut the bullshit, just make sure I’m sitting where I have a clear sight line to him, I’ll be there in 30 seconds.

1. The Smiling Poncho (All staff must wear a poncho, and the chef will wear a sombrero with little, hooked fish hanging off the brim. It will be fun!)

2. Fish and Ships (You will sell ship knickknacks as an alternate revenue stream at the front desk.)

3. Clamorama (Deep-fried clams will be a specialty.)

4. Blood In The Water (This Risto will have a shark-attack themed décor. It will really stand out from the crowd and when you order the signature plate of paella, the theme music to Jaws will play as the serving staff brings it out. We will be a destination for birthday and bachelor parties, so if legal, we will have all serving staff working in bikinis and speedos. GAY FRIENDLY.)

4. Los Peces Sexy (Obviously, this means The Sexy Fish in Spanish. Consider Tango dance lessons in the evening?)

5. Scales And Males (This would be a gay restaurant)

6. Scales And Tails and Males (This would be a more flamboyant and risque gay restaurant)

7. Something Fishy. (This is cute, and I think that each night you should stage a marine-themed murder mystery production as entertainment for the dining guests.)

8. Crabbies (Part of the appeal of this incarnation would be the gruff, sailor-like atmosphere and service.)

9. Fishing for a compliment? (Could become popular with people on first dates!)

10. The Fishcotheque (On the weekends it a disco and fine seafood restaurant.)