11.18.2006

This week was a pretty challenging one for both DH and I. Some jobs, such as doctors, lawyers and therapists have a higher level of long term stress than others. To survive, you have remain 'objective' and turn work off when you leave the office, but it is very difficult to do so, particularly if one tries to retain any humanity at all or treat one's clients with empathy or compassion. I suppose the job wouldn't be nearly so stressful if I could just focus on squeezing every penny I could out of people and not give a shit about them, if I wouldn't care about how black my heart and soul got. And then I could go on expensive vacations, payoff my house, have lots of toys. Doesn't really seem worth it though. The being a bastard part, I mean. I'd hate to have to look in the mirror. Or live with myself.

At any rate, last night, DH and I decided to go down to the city (in this neck of the woods, 'the city' can only mean NYC), to the friendly little bar we discovered several years ago (a throwback to another era) and visit our friends.

It's been a really long time, DH has not been down since July and I hadn't been since February. I am so, so glad we went - and I had so much fun that I just had to sit down and write even though it's so late - or early - and we just now got back.

We left around 8:30 last night, encountered little traffic and got down there around 11ish. There was some construction on Houston Street, so what would normally take 5 minutes took almost forty just to go a few city blocks. But, being the city, there was plenty to look at as we were sitting, creeping along. Taxi drivers to vehicularly spar with, fashion models to eye, billboards to laugh at, young professionals interacting(trying to get laid, trying to impress). A veritable cultural anthropology/sociology lab. I got big crushing hugs from our friends, Lisa the bartender, Elo the bouncer and pool savant, Jason the federal professional and pool savant, and even Nikki the bartender was quite friendly - she actually said 'hi' to me and, for the first time ever, made eye contact with me(she's only nice to women she's interested in). Lisa bought us several rounds, we played good music on the jukebox and had impromptu sing-a-longs to Jam and Sex Pistols songs with strangers, we walked around in all the hustle and bustle, hung around on the street and talked and had some utterly awesome mexican food at a little hole in the wall called La Esquina. When I say awesome Mexican, I mean real, authentic food, not the New England idea (Taco Bell). Shredded beef, not hamburger; cilantro; warm corn tortillas, not flour; real chilis, not some runny sauce made from supermarket chili powder - sheer heaven. Having grown up in southern California, I haven't had real Mexican food for 11 years - the last time I was in California(that time I stopped by Gallegos and smuggled home 5 dozen corn tortillas in my suitcase - wish I had brought more). I mean, for Pete's sake, the only way I can get masa harina out here is if I buy Carol Shelby's chili mix - I get about a tablespoon in each package - it's just sad. Very sad. My sister used to mail me dried chilis to make sauce. So, I was quite thrilled, to say the least. My mouth was in heaven. Now, all I want to do is go back and eat there some more.

So, we left about five this morning (after most of the other bars close at three or three-thirty, we get to hangout in the bar as a 'local') and got to see a beautiful sunrise when we got close to home. And now, I am going to go snuggle with my honey and doze for a few hours.