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“How did your parents react to finding out you were gay?”
“They basically just brushed it aside. They were in the middle of an argument, which was nothing new. They were always fighting about something, so when my dad moved out a couple of months later, it was actually a relief. At least it put an end to the constant bickering.” Wow, really? Did I just go from telling this guy about a kid with carrots up his nose to my parents’ divorce?
“That sounds difficult.”
“It wasn’t great, but at least I had my Gran.”
“It seems unusual to call a Russian grandmother Gran.”
“What’s even more unusual is that I actually addressed her by name, at her insistence. I probably would have called her Bubbe since we’re Jewish, but she thought anything along those lines made her sound old. Somehow, I got in the habit of calling her Gran when I was talking to other people, so they knew who I’m referring to.”
“Is she still with us?”
“No. She died three years ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
This was hard to talk about, so I abruptly changed the subject. “Were you born in Russia?”
“Yes. I’ve tried to lose the accent, but clearly, I haven’t succeeded.”
“Why would you want to get rid of the accent? I think it’s charming.”
“I wanted to blend in with my American classmates. My mother and I emigrated when I was eleven.”
“It’s funny, don’t you think? We try so hard to blend in as kids, to be like everyone else,” I said. “But then as we get older, we start to realize the things that make us different are some of the best parts of us.
“Take me, for example. I always got in trouble for being impulsive, loud, and way too high-energy to sit quietly and do what I was told. But now, I’m glad I’m a misfit. What kind of a life lesson is that, anyway? Behave, be quiet, don’t rock the boat. Where would we be as a society if everyone just conformed? There’d be no invention, no art, no music. We’d all just go along like robots, trying to fit inside a box. No thanks. And yeah, I know this is big talk for someone who works as a waiter. It’s not like I’m out there changing the world. But that job isn’t who I am, and it’s not forever.”
Right about then, I realized I was rambling. I glanced at him and said, “Sorry. I didn’t mean to go off on that tangent.”
“I like hearing what you have to say.” After a lull in the conversation, he asked, “So, tell me—what’s next for you, since you said that job isn’t forever?”
“I’m in the process of figuring that out, and I’m on a deadline. By the time I turn thirty this December, I want to be ready to make a change. I just have to come up with a plan, then figure out how to make it happen.”
He asked, “If you had the resources to do anything you wanted, what would you do?”
I didn’t even have to think about it. “I’d travel.”
“Where would you go?”
“Everywhere.”
“Give me some examples.”
“One day, I’m going to surf in Australia, and ski the Swiss Alps, and swim with dolphins in the Azores. I’ll bike across Southeast Asia, and travel to the Arctic Circle, and make love under the Northern Lights.
“That’s just off the top of my head. There’s so much out there to see, and to experience, and I know it probably sounds like a pipe dream. But I’ll make it happen, even if it takes the rest of my life.”
“I admire your passion.”
He was probably just being nice. I must sound like I had my head in the clouds. “Well, first I have to figure out how to actually pay for those plane tickets. I was thinking I might go back to school, and maybe that’ll lead to a good job…” Why was I still rambling like this? “Anyway, enough about me. Tell me about you.”
“There’s not much to tell.”
“That’s not true. Tell me about your job. I know what it says on your business card, but what do you do, exactly?”
“I move money around and make rich people richer.”
“That’s not all you do. You also get to be the boss, right? The head honcho, the man in charge. That’s probably pretty cool.”
He shrugged and said, “I like not answering to anyone.”
Since there was no traffic at this hour on a Wednesday night, we reached our destination quickly. That was a bummer, because I would have loved to keep talking to him. As the car pulled up in front of the pink Victorian, he said, “You’ll call in sick tomorrow to give your back a chance to heal, won’t you?”
“No. I can’t miss work.”
We both unfastened our seatbelts, and he turned to me and started to reach for the money clip he kept in his inside jacket pocket. “What if I give you what you would have earned in tips? Then can you stay home and rest?”
