A Westcoast Witch in Salem

I wasn't sure if I would add to this blog or start another, but the gist of what I had to say in 'Gill in Georgetown' is still my main message. So when I see examples of this hard-learned lesson to appreciate the life we have, well, I just have to remark on it. I am a full two months now in quaint-but-gritty Salem, MA, a town that is around 400 years old, and of course, infamous.

I was lucky to land a job here as Hostess and Marketing Manager for a small, wife and chef owned restaurant, featuring modern and rustic Italian cuisine and amazing wines. The staff- both front and back of the house- have been virtually all the people I have met in town, they are 20 and 30 somethings, all very involved with food. Occasionally staff family members come in for dinner and we try to make it extra special for them.

Tonight a line cook's sister came in, with their parents, for the sister's 30th birthday. We all said happy birthday to the sister. She did not respond. We all welcomed them. I did not one, but two table checks to introduce myself and ask them if 'their girl in the kitchen was doing a good job for them.' I got silent nods, a weak smile. About 10 or 15 minutes later, a regular guest also sitting in the back dining room came up to me up front to say he was sorry that his family, and their 9 month old baby, had upset another diner to the point she had gone to their table to complain about the baby. I was mortified. Who was this??? The dad indicated the perpetrator...it was the sister. She was fuming that it was her 30th birthday and she didn't come to a supposed nice place like this to have to deal with a child. She got enough of that on the train. Holy smokes!

I was absolutely speechless. I listened to the sister- and her father- complain and belittle the room, the other diners and I couldn't believe any family member would behave like this KNOWING their daughter/sibling worked there. They did not say anything to me when I had visited their table- they could have and I might have moved them or tried another solution. But that would not have accomplished what the sister was after. It was her 30th birthday and she was out, alone, with her parents. She was miserable and was looking for a victim to target with her misery. Before I learned any details about this young woman I realized two things instantly. 1) She was unhappy to the core. 2) She had suffered some damaging blow to her ego that required she diminish all others to elevate herself.

And the reason I am writing about this at all is a horrible thing to have to admit: she reminded me, OF ME. I was once that miserable, superior bitch. I was the one who wanted everyone in earshot to know that I was smarter and classier than they were. I was suffering in non-silence and it seeped out of me like a bad odor but I could not see it. The fog of my awful attitude kept anyone from bothering to challenge me or to look for the source. Now, more than two decades from the darkest times for me, I am not sure if I can completely articulate what I was so angry about. Or why it took so long, including two children and cancer, to get over it.

I felt alone. I felt abandoned and let down. I was looking for affirmation from the outside in, instead of the other way around. I, like this young beautiful woman, hated myself and did not know why. I did not understand that I had value beyond being the smartest and classiest one in the room. I had not learned to be a human being and stop mourning relationships that would never happen and embrace the bonds I actually had to friends and family.

The line cook sister was so embarrassed and apologetic. This was a pattern apparently. I told her I felt bad for her and that her sister was obviously a very unhappy girl. 'Her fiance left her a month before the wedding last October'. Aha. And there she was turning 30, single, with her parents, and that woman sitting at the corner table had the audacity to be happy, married, out with friends and her charming son. Oh the nerve.

My heart broke a little for the 30th bday sister. I knew she would even feel worse later. She might even have a moment of remorse at upsetting an entire dining room's evening. But mostly she would feel sorry for herself. And I wished that I could tell her to not wait 20 years to figure it out. To not have to bury suicides and file divorces to understand. To not wait until the doctors divide your remaining time on the planet into 5 year increments and percentages in order to embrace living. There are so many missed opportunities in anger and resentment. It might be hard for that girl to imagine in her rigidity that that could have been a room of potential friends, wanting to share in a toast for her birthday. Not enemies. Not 'trash', people so below her very important job and life, but individuals who might look at her and see a lovely woman, entering the best years of her life, smart and classy.