My Mother Is A Container of Yogurt
Nov. 14th, 2007 09:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mallorys_cameraI joined a book club.
I didn't join it because I need to talk about books.
I joined it because I need to troll for casual acquaintances. People to have lunch with.
Figure there are two types of friendship. There are those people with whom you will always feel connected because they live in your heart – a cute little garden apartment in the pueblo complex right above your right aorta.
Then there are the people with whom you form connections because circumstances throw you together. There's a slot in your life marked "Best Buddy At Work." Somebody's got to fill it. And you can end up feeling great affection for that person, those people, but you know you're not going to take them with you when you move on.
I've always been very good at the first connection, rather rotten at the second: I don't have a talent for acquaintance. Acquaintance, though, forms the majority of one's social interactions, particularly when one gets to my advanced age. So I need to buff up my supply of them: I've been feeling rather isolated as of late.
Which is why I joined a book club.
First book we're reading: As I Lay Dying. Book club meets tonight so naturally I started the novel yesterday afternoon.
I must say there's a reason why I managed to avoid Faulkner all these years. The book is excellent but it's squicking me out seriously – reading it is kind of like the literary equivalent of standing naked in the Mojave desert at high noon. The brilliance and pitilessness of the prose is depleting. I could be struck blind by it at any time.
In other news, indifferent repast with the lovely and talented Marybeth dernier soir. We ate at a Mexican place called Zocalos. They served me my flautas with a kind of yogurt sauce. I could just hear Gordon Ramsay saying, "Well, fuck me – what kind of crap is this?"
When I got home I described the meal to Ben who wrinkled his nose and said, "Well they do serve flautas with yogurt in Mexico. Well – not yogurt exactly. A very heavy sour cream, crema."
"This wasn't crema, Ben," I said. "It was Dannon's that sat in the fridge too long."
I didn't join it because I need to talk about books.
I joined it because I need to troll for casual acquaintances. People to have lunch with.
Figure there are two types of friendship. There are those people with whom you will always feel connected because they live in your heart – a cute little garden apartment in the pueblo complex right above your right aorta.
Then there are the people with whom you form connections because circumstances throw you together. There's a slot in your life marked "Best Buddy At Work." Somebody's got to fill it. And you can end up feeling great affection for that person, those people, but you know you're not going to take them with you when you move on.
I've always been very good at the first connection, rather rotten at the second: I don't have a talent for acquaintance. Acquaintance, though, forms the majority of one's social interactions, particularly when one gets to my advanced age. So I need to buff up my supply of them: I've been feeling rather isolated as of late.
Which is why I joined a book club.
First book we're reading: As I Lay Dying. Book club meets tonight so naturally I started the novel yesterday afternoon.
I must say there's a reason why I managed to avoid Faulkner all these years. The book is excellent but it's squicking me out seriously – reading it is kind of like the literary equivalent of standing naked in the Mojave desert at high noon. The brilliance and pitilessness of the prose is depleting. I could be struck blind by it at any time.
In other news, indifferent repast with the lovely and talented Marybeth dernier soir. We ate at a Mexican place called Zocalos. They served me my flautas with a kind of yogurt sauce. I could just hear Gordon Ramsay saying, "Well, fuck me – what kind of crap is this?"
When I got home I described the meal to Ben who wrinkled his nose and said, "Well they do serve flautas with yogurt in Mexico. Well – not yogurt exactly. A very heavy sour cream, crema."
"This wasn't crema, Ben," I said. "It was Dannon's that sat in the fridge too long."
