I Just Have That Look, I Guess

“So are you and your wife vegetarian?” my co-worker asks.

“No, I mean, I am, but she is an unrepentant omnivore,” I say. “But I don’t remember saying either of us was, so how did you know?”

She looks me up and down and says, “Well, I have to admit I kind of stereotyped."

Consolation Prize

The street fair ends at a pizza shop that’s set up a tent outside with a little beer garden and people selling slices to the passers-by. They also have a DJ playing middle-of-the-road hits at ear-bleeding volume while a middle-aged guy with a receding hairline who’s probably the manager shouts over the music through a microphone. 

“I’ve got a t-shirt from our shop as a prize for the best dancer in Brooklyn!” he yells as a bunch of white ladies half-heartedly boogie to Marvin Gaye’s “Got To Give It Up.”

“Your prize for being the best dancer in Brooklyn is a mediocre t-shirt,” Katie says.

Dismissed

The dog, a curly-headed little russet puppy, clocks me walking down 7th Avenue from about a block away.

Unlike most New York dogs, who are a little too bored to get too excited for a new person, this dog leaps onto his hind legs and begins to dance a little jig.

When I finally arrive next to him and his owner, he immediately stops dancing and, after a few desultory licks, commences looking for the next person down the block.

“Looks like I’ve been dismissed,” I say to his owner, who nods back sadly.

Like an Animal

Katie and I help out the neighbors by occasionally walking their dog. We wrap the harness under and around her tiny, smooth-furred frame, and take her downstairs, where she immediately pulls us around the corner to a tree beside which a bald man stands between two cars, pissing on the street.

“Looks like everybody is peeing here tonight,” Katie says as the dog squats to do her business.

“Sorry, I just couldn’t hold it anymore,” the guy mutters as he continues to do his.

Former Mayor of New York

We’re riding in a car to a meeting for Katie’s business, about to cross the bridge, when I do that thing that apparently I’ve done since I was a very little child and start reading interesting signs I haven’t seen before.

“Forno’s Italian Restaurant and Cafe,” I pronounce, as if I’m reading scripture at Sunday service.

“Was that the name of the pizza place by where we stayed in Chicago?” Katie asks.

“I keep wanting to say ‘Fiorello’s’ but I know that’s not it,” I reply.

Too Tight

In my new job with shoes, I find myself noticing what people wear on their feet, and I try to identify it and translate it, like I’m attempting to learn a new language.

One woman wears an espadrille with a perforated orange shell and an ankle strap, and the contrast between the texture of the sole and the strapiness of it reads like a dialect where I understand the words individually, but the overall meaning eludes me: a failed seduction.

The woman next to her wears a snake skin sandal with a heel and an ankle strap, but the toe strap is far too narrow for her feet, and her toes are crushed together, leaving the bone at the joint of her big toe protruding alarmingly. Her face is pinched and drawn too, and when she looks up from her phone, she seems to regard the world with a look of pained disappointment.

American Flag As Warning Sign

My co-worker and I have to ride the freight elevator down to the second basement to put the extra inventory into overstock, and two guys who are working in construction on the new store are riding with us.

“Nancy Pelosi announces impeachment inquiry,” one of the guys says, looking down at his phone. He’s wearing a t-shirt with an American flag on it.

As we arrive at our floor, the other construction guy says, “What?” but I hustle to get off the elevator so I don’t have to hear what the first guy replies.