A New Set of Friends

Last Friday’s headlines read: “Glitch Freezes NASDAQ Trading.” Some suspect a credit card overload. My wife is in New York shopping. A coincidence?

**********

August heat in South Georgia is insufferable. Many flee for refuge to the mountains, others to Europe. My wife and friends head to New York City. Why? Do you have to ask? Shopping and dining, of course.

I don’t blame her. The Fall Collection at the Nearly New Shop is hardly haute couture. After all, women are creatures of style, not function. Plus, Outback takeout won’t even qualify for dumpster dining in New York.

I once asked, “Why New York, what’s wrong with Target?”

“Because I’m a woman, remember?” (Her answer solves a lot of unanswered questions) She gives me the ‘look’ that all men recognize when they open their mouths without thinking, which is much of the time. It’s the look that suggests even troglodytes are not dumb enough to ask that question.

“I’m going to ‘visit’ a new set of friends.” ‘Visit’ is code for shopping. At the airport her parting words are, “Don’t be surprised.” The emphasis on ‘surprised’ is the trigger. I immediately alert my banker.

Her friend has a co-op in the lower Westside Village. It’s where $30 million condos rub elbows with flats smaller than closets. It’s a long way from the shopping minefields of 5th Avenue. I think I’m safe. Men just shouldn’t think about some things.

Boutiques flourish there along with the Spotted Pig, an upscale bistro popular with the cognoscenti who nibble on escargot and sip champagne. Down South, a place with such a name would be a smoky BBQ joint, where the special du jour is always predictable: cold Bud and fried pig skins.

Boutiques will bite your wallet…small shop, expensive merchandise. I prefer street vendors. Their kiosks line the streets like carnival sideshows. They sell everything from $25 Prada knock-offs to $5 pretzels with yellow mustard.

A vendor once sold me a $50 ‘gold’ Rolex. I surprised my brother with it. He’s still scrubbing the ‘gold’ from his wrist. He hasn’t spoken to me in three years. He never could take a joke.

My wife calls daily. She says she’s ‘pacing’ herself. I ask how she defines ‘pacing.’ “Which, shopping or food?” she asks. She deflects my question with a question, a well-honed tactic. Women are hard to pin down.

Men pace themselves in different ways. They have keen internal restraint systems. It’s a primordial genetic arrangement that paces their proclivities. It functions flawlessly except in situations involving women, football, golf or guns. Nobody’s perfect.

On Friday she calls, all excited. She says she met new friends at Harry Winston. “Who’s that?” I ask. She says Harry has exquisite taste, a delightful shop and he is well connected. ‘Delightful’ is code for extravagant. Anybody in New York who’s connected and wants you to call them by their first name is suspect. I envision an arm around my shoulder and a hand in my back pocket.

“What does Harry sell?” I ask. She answers, “I’ll give you a hint. It’s a girl’s best friend.” Right away I know Harry’s not a used car salesman.

I’m wary of men whose first and last names are interchangeable. I knew somebody like that in high school, Harry Harvey. He had weird ways, like catching house flies in mid-flight with his tongue. He wasn’t Valedictorian.

She calls again on Saturday. “You won’t believe what I found at Ralph’s shop.” I ask if I know Ralph. She says nobody knows him, he changed his name. I ask why. “What would you do if your last name were Lifshitz?” What a slickster…he would be a terrific New York politician.

That night she calls again, thrilled with all her new first-name friends…Giorgio, Donna, Coco, Calvin and many Italians whose names end with vowels: Salvatore, Veneta and Morelli. The list is long.

“When are you coming home? I’m starving for a home-cooked meal,” I plead. “Tomorrow about 2:00,” she says. “Pick me up in the truck. I have a surprise for you.” I remember hearing that word before. Hmmmm. I’m sleepless in fearful anticipation.

************

I pull up in the pickup. She stands on the curb with her luggage. “Didn’t you leave with one bag? What’s with the ten?”

“I paced myself,” she says grinning. “I told you not to be surprised. We now have a whole new set of friends. You’ll just love them.”

I can hardly contain my enthusiasm.

Bud Hearn
August 30, 2013


Illustration courtesy of Leslie Hearn