My Gawd I'm exhausted. It's been one of those weekends where nothing goes as planned (not that that's a bad thing) and when I look back on my calendar all I can think is - wow...I did none of those things. But it was just as productive. I ended up working three shifts at the restaurant on Saturday. Three. That's 9am-1am, roughly. Usually I work three shifts a week, but it was nice to just get there and stay there, knowing my car was safely parked, knowing I was in a place where the chaos was predictable, knowing I was going to make some serious money and I did. I had a bit of a meltdown in the middle of dinner service though, actually it was about Michael. I was walking upstairs to the soirée kitchen with Tony, our main Monday Club Bar chef, to get butter lettuces that they'd under-stocked, and he made some reference to his step-mother being very ill and out of the blue I crumpled on the stairs in this stupid, dramatic heap. Poor guy didn't really know what to make of me. I felt really embarrassed and was trying to get myself together but what was keeping me crying was a bleak and gruesome image of what it must have looked like when Michael was found in that hotel room. I'm assuming when booze wasn't the only thing that did him in so there must have been other crap around him, and alcohol poisoning does ugly things to your body before it eats you, that's to say, I'm guessing he puked. I wonder if he had his false teeth in when he passed out, what he was wearing, what he'd been spending the night doing. It's a thought I'm pretty haunted by, and poor Tony sat down next to me and just sat there with me, totally quiet, until I could banish the image and get up off the steps.
I know this is a weird transition, but I really can't think of how to end that last paragraph. Other than that the night went unusually smoothly. I worked the center of the MCB and did about three turnovers of my section, including one birthday - it made me so happy to see this family's face light up when I came out with their beautifully decorated plate and the candles and the sparklers and set it all in front of their father. I forget that this job makes me happy in simple ways. Also, everyone ordered really expensive bottles of wine, so that's always nice. It was great to walk out of there and get my ass home and crawl into bed with my the balls of my feet aching and my lower back in one single knot because those clogs have a little bit of a lift in them, and feeling my heartbeat in my toes. I felt useful and productive and as though I was making some small contribution.
It snowed last night. It was so cold that it didn't even melt in the streets and came down in teddy bear-sized flakes. It's so gray and foggy out I cant see the hills only two miles away. I'm trying to write this sestina for my poetry class in an hour, so I'm gonna get on that, and probably post it if it's not utter drivel. Here's my first stanza...I'm guessing I'll have to re-think a few of these end words:
The snow wouldn’t melt on the cold road
and collected, as though being cold was effortless.
Our mother cried, silently, with her mouth open,
We hushed in the back seat and took in no air.
It used to be a big deal, these episodes;
By now we knew better than to take her hand.
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