April 2006

Earl and I decided that we wanted to have a date of sorts tonight, so after working out at the gym this afternoon we made ourselves presentable, threw on some duds and headed to a local steakhouse.

The steakhouse is neighbors with the local theatre, and this week Cinderella: The Ballet is in town. Since I work right across the street from the theatre, I should have remember this from passing under the marquee all week, but I didn’t remember until we got to the area and saw that it was quite busy. The street traffic was a welcomed change for the usually dead Saturday night in this area.

We were pleasantly surprised to be seated immediately, having arrived about 20 minutes before curtain time. Along side of us was a party of about ten, including three young children, roughly early elementary school age. They were accompanied by their mothers, who appeared to either be friends or sisters, and an elderly couple that we deduced were somebody’s grandparents.

The kids were hedging into holy terror territory running around the tables of others, taking their shoes and socks off and storing them under the table, ripping loaves of bread in half and making like Hansel and Gretel. In the sad fashion on today’s parental generation, the mothers apparently couldn’t of cared less, save for the one that started counting “one, two, three” as if the Sesame Street numbers routine was going to scare the wrath of God into the children. Amongst all the noise from the table, the kids were screaming about how excited they were to being seeing Cinderella. Except it was 7:15. And curtain time was 7:30, and they were just being served their salads.

“This can’t be good”, I whispered to Earl.

Around 7:20, Count Monster Mom started flapping her arms like a demented windmill in an effort to flag down the waiter. “You need to bring the kids their food right now, they don’t need to wait for the other meals to be served.” Why discipline when you can stuff their mouths shut? Small wonder today’s youth is fat. Nevertheless, the waiter brought the kids their food.

It was nearly 7:25 when the remaining meals were brought to the table. At 7:30, as they were still digging in to their meals and undoubtedly the curtain was going up next store, Count Monster Mom did the windmill routine again and then snapped her fingers in the air (I’ve never seen that before in real life; how rude!) in a stereotypical “Garçon!” move, demanding the check. She then asked for the manager to come to the table.

I couldn’t hear the entire conversation, but Earl and I did our best to Gladys Kravitz what was going on next door.

“This restaurant is next door to the theatre, we thought a 6:00 reservation would give us ample time to eat before the show started. You should be taking 15% off the check.”

“Yes ma’am, I understand, but you arrived at 6:45. We’ve been located next to the theatre for a long time. One and a half hours before curtain with a party of ten is cutting it rather close.”

“But we have to take most of our meals with us since the show has already started. You really should take something off the check.”

“I’m sorry ma’am, but I can’t do that, as you were 45 minutes late for your reservation.”

Count Monster Mom then got all huffy and started shoveling her food into the take-out containers, gathered up her gaggle of monsters and headed for the door.

The grandparents decided to stay and finish their meal in peace. Earl and I enjoyed the silence after their departure as well.

As more and more sound invades our space these days with the increasing number of advertisements, gizmos, technological marvels and what not, I began to wonder if it’s possible to experience silence these days. I’m not talking about awkwards gaps in conversation or people not speaking, but rather just an absence of sound.

I know that total silence is theoretically impossible. After all, if you’re engulfed in total silence, you’re probably going to hear the sound of your own heartbeat. But what’s it like to listen to nothing? No sound of a ventilation fan in the background; no hum of a computer system; no melodies of wind chimes dancing in the wind. Would I feel completely at peace in total silence or rather completely frustrated because one of my senses was not being stimulated.

There are people that don’t like silence. They walk into a room in their house, hear nothing and know that the kids have moved on to their adult lives. Others with younger kids may take silence as an indicator of mischief occurring elsewhere in the house. Some can work with a radio in the background, others can’t stand the distraction. I find it all quite fascinating, but then again, I feel humans fascinating in general.

Sometimes I think the whir of machinery and the bells and whistles of technology, always present in the background, subliminally annoy us in this whirlwind we call life. These ambient noises just add a little more steam to our tea kettle of a mind, causing it to be that much closer to speaking out and letting off some steam. Perhaps I need to find a nice comfortable spot in the woods or in the desert during our upcoming trip and just do nothing except enjoy the silence.

Earl is out of town in New England tonight on business. Suspiciously, when I called him to see how things were going, he informed me that he was currently winning at Foxwoods Casino in eastern Connecticut. “I thought your meetings were in Massachusetts and Vermont.” “They are.” I guess the casino was a stone’s throw away or something.

But that’s another blog entry.

Since Earl was out of town and my sister is back from Russia, I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to meet up with my mother and her for supper tonight. So I trekked off to Syracuse after work.

Mom had a hair appointment after work, so Jennifer and I met up and caught up over a couple of beers and some munchies. She told me about living in Russia for eight months and all that entailed, I shared with her stories about recently traveling to Virginia and what’s been going on while she was gone. Mom joined us a little later (with a spiffed up ‘do) and we enjoyed some good conversation over supper. I know Tully’s is a chain of restaurant, but they seem to have a stamp of “Syracuse” on them, and I’ve mentioned before that I’m very “Syracuse Proud”.

It may be the beer in me that’s getting me all sentimental but I guess I’m a lucky guy to have a sister that I can call one of my best friends. When we were growing up, she always joined me on my little schemes, whether it was rearranging trees in the woods behind the house, jumping over the electric fence to do our own version of running with the bulls in the pasture or setting up a play grocery store, complete with express checkouts, in the basement. Hell, she even sang Linda Mc Cartney’s part in “Silly Love Songs” when I decided I want to sing a number one track while using the wood pile as a soundstage. Now that we’re adults, we tell each other just about everything and still giggle and laugh at the same things. And my mom joins right in with the conversation; she’s always been her own person and still lives up to that – I mean how many 50+ year old women decide to dress up their Saturn sedan by having flames added to the door panels?

While I miss Earl tonight as he does his business trip, I’m glad that I was able to hang out with a couple of my friends, who just happen to be family.