Of all days, I should not have chosen this particular one to run out of the house coatless. The sun disappeared by the end of my three-hour ESL class, and a cold drizzle has been falling ever since as I corrected exams and planned supplemental lessons for our remaining days. With so many students from so many different cultures, the textbook barely covers their needs, from puzzling grammar to pronunciation challenges. As for me, I need nourishment today beyond my usual Subway sandwich.
I need food for body and soul, and the Guatemalan place next door, with its upbeat music and usual contingent of laughing workmen in Carhartts, is just the place. It’s not fancy, but as the midday meal is the main meal, it isn’t cheap either. I go there when I want to practice my Spanish, eavesdropping on the other diners and listening to the music—about love mostly, as it is everywhere.
There aren’t many people this time, but I order the chicken soup and am rewarded with a steaming bowl of veggies in a broth rich with fat globules and garnished with lime wedges and cilantro. The chicken, however, a fried leg joint, is served on the side with a bowl of rice, some tortillas, and a spoon. What to do? I haven’t eaten chicken with the fingers since I was a child. My father, who wore Dickies like all blue-collar workers in the Sixties, ate chicken that way, as well as pork chops turkey drumsticks. Then Emily Post told me in a TV commercial that was just for picnics, and I took up my utensils. The waitress seems mildly surprised when I ask for a knife and fork, but I don’t mind. It’s not like a grey-haired white lady will look inconspicuous here no matter what she does.
A crew of a dozen tree-trimmers hustles in from the rain, all jokes and back slaps. They push together the four tables nearest mine and, without consulting the menu, all order what I’m having. I’ve chosen well. As I finish sawing away at my meat and shredding it from the bone, I note how they scoop their rice into the broth and then tear into the chicken bare-handed, the way my dad used to., and for a moment, I am ten again. I hold that feeling for a long while, waiting for the waitress to bring my check. These people are in no hurry, and that’s fine with me today.
From the table beyond, a new diner catches my eye, a middle-aged black man. I’ve never seen a non-Hispanic here before, and we two outsiders swap conspiratorial grins as he consults the menu, visibly puzzled. I laugh in recognition.
By the time I settle the bill and pass him on my way out, he’s still reading the menu. He asks in a charming Caribbean accent what’s good here, and I recommend the soup, joking about how we both are out-of-place. He says he just moved here from Guyana, and that leads to a little discussion about languages.
I finally say I really must be going, and calls after me, “Are you married?”
“Yes,” I say, waving a cheery goodbye and thinking again about those universal languages of food and music—and how they’re mostly about love, all over the world.