My mother, Betsy, is a terrific cook. This Christmas, at our home in Cambridge, she produced the entire menu from Gourmet magazine, from the butternut squash soup to the pepper encrusted roast beef to the pomegranate eggnog tart. She worked for days, making everything just right. It was a meal fit for a king. Or for my mom’s two boyfriends, both of whom were invited to our Christmas dinner.
The three of us—Bob, Kameel, and I—stood around in silence, fingering the flutes of our champagne glasses while my mother put the final touches on the gravy. Finally she cried, “Whoooo’s starving?” in the kindergarten tone of voice that demands a raised hand. A voice I have tried for years if not decades to discourage. Worse, though, was the fact that both Bob and Kameel continued to stand in silence, hands by their side.
Until, “I’m not really that hungry,” said Bob.
Bob, seriously. Who comes to Christmas dinner not hungry—and even if you ate a big bowl of cereal an hour earlier because you couldn’t hold out, you do not say so in front of your hostess, who’s spent three days preparing the meal you’re about to spend the next three hours eating.
Furious, I raised my hand halfheartedly and said, “Yeah, Mom, I’m starving.”
Then Kameel cleared his throat and announced, “Betsy, I could never call myself ‘starving’ when there are so many truly starving people in the world.” He stared stony faced at my mother, who was holding a bowl of gravy in one hand and offering him a glass of home-squeezed pomegranate juice in the other. She returned the look and in that moment I could see how the entire dinner would unfold: with agonizing solemnity.
“Okay. Well, who’s reeeally hungry!?”
Bob and Kameel had never met before, and I imagine they will never meet again. Kameel, a Palestinian vegetarian who rides his bike everywhere, was both bald and ponytailed. The first thing he told us was that he had joined an “Arabic dance troupe,” and then he performed knee-lunges and arm-thrusts on our kitchen floor. Bob, an awkward but surprisingly good-looking man, was interested exclusively in wine and cinema and was completely unable to participate in any conversation that involved neither one nor the other.
In fact, whenever conversation took a disagreeable turn for Bob, he took out a little notebook from his pocket and jotted notes. He did this every few minutes. Finally Kameel set down his silverware and asked, “Bob. Are you taking notes on the wine?”
“Yes. I am.”
Bob also slurped the wine and gurgled it in his mouth towards the end of the meal, which my mother excused lightly as “What true oenophiles do!” I thought it was completely unacceptable, and watched in transfixed disgust as he bubbled sips of wine while peering down his nose through dainty glasses at the little pad in front of him, laughing maturely to himself and noting how the oakiness of the shiraz interacted with how much of an ass he was.
Kameel spent much of the dinner looking aloof and staring blankly from his close-set falcon eyes, telling us about Boston’s bike paths. The more I drank, the less inhibited I felt about staring at the ratty gray hair hanging limply from his balding head. There were many more bike rules than I expected.
Dinner lurched along, held tenuously afloat at times only by discussion of the food’s flavor. My original plan had been to get really drunk and release a whirlwind of inappropriate jokes, but I hadn’t been prepared for the complete humorlessness and social ineptitude of my audience, so I excused myself as soon as possible, leaving the three grownups to pick over the long-dead carcass of pleasant conversation that wallowed in their awkward silences.
My mother saw me to the door, kissed me on the cheek and thanked me for all my help with Christmas. For whatever reason, I think she had a nice time. The food was delicious, and well, if you invite your two boyfriends what do you expect?
Then I fell down the stairs.
It was drizzling rain and our old, warped steps can be very slippery. She was calling out “Bye!” for the third time when I slipped, ending up wedged between the iron banister and the brick pathway in a frustrating position that actually prevented me from being able to move at all.
“Oh my goodness, Edith, are you drunk!?”
“No! I’m not drunk! Those stairs are REALLY SLIPPERY! Will you please come help me?” I yelled as dark puddles seeped into my pants and jacket. I had just finished my third glass of wine, and it was stormy and windy and I was about to get on the Mass Pike in my fragile car, but apparently a strong “No, I’m not drunk!” was enough to prove that in fact I was not drunk, because she said “Okay sweetie, see you later,” and shut the door.
Perhaps she couldn’t wait to get back inside to be affectionate with her boyfriends. Who would be the lucky man? I found out later that Kameel went upstairs with her to watch a movie while Bob “had to go home,” probably to transcribe notes into one of his “thirty-five master wine books.” I kid you not. I generally try to stay out of my mother’s business, but sometimes it’s too good to ignore.
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