"Gimme Red!", I smiled my "Everready" smile and matched it with the wink and slight wag of my head that is an essential skill of immense survival value here. I was at my fave local Thai restaurant, Dao, which sits right across the road from the neglected "Indian Garden" which serves crossover food.
As the waiter hurried away with my order for the "Red curry" I smiled, relaxed and felt quite happy. A digression is inevitable here. It's high time, we Indians helped the R&D dept of Thai restaurants come up with more creative names for their curries, no? (I love the way we say 'no' for every expected 'yes'!) I mean after colors, they should move on to monosyllablic names at least, yaar!
So stumbling back upon my thoughts, I smiled a triumphant smile and allowed some pride to peek through my eyes too. A year ago (yes, it's been more than a year,now!) I had either shed tears or fought pangs of loneliness for every single morsel that I ate by myself, stranded on the island of my plush grad housing apartment. Why? I had always been that way; even when eating the cold food that some dear friend had saved for me in the mess, back in my IIT days. Today showed me how far I really had come, because there I was, determined to dispel the gloom that a Friday night spent alone indoors tends to bring on. I went alone shopping on "The Magnificent Mile", a stretch of Michigan Avenue that is a shopper's paradise, looking for a wedding dress to wear at Lori's wedding tomorrow. On my way back, intending to grab a sandwich from Potbelly's, I was trying to cheer myself up from the unknown sadness that had engulfed me since evening, when I passed Dao. Now, Thai food is my weak-point and I quickly entered Dao thinking of carrying out a nice curry and rice. And then, I surprised myself by asking for a table for 1! I have never done this before! It was so refreshing to just sit by myself and eat. While my food came I at first felt awkward sitting there and staring at everyone else. I thought of calling up someone, just to appear all important and busy and 'social'. Resisting that urge I thought, "what the hell do I care about what they think of me or my lack of social circle!" It set me free, I swear!
The food seemed even more delicious and spicy. My new found confidence was put to test when a friend called back. I had called him earlier before entering Dao, as a last attempt to seek company for dinner. I answered the questions "You were alone?" and "You ate there or took it away?" with a steady voice, no second thoughts and truthfully!
So far, so good!
