addendum (lyn)

Get home around 4:30.  There's a message from my mom.  "Well, I finally was able to leave the house.  I have been sitting Shiva since last night for my beautiful, beloved Patriots."  Could it be she meant to call my sister, the one who lives in Massachusetts?

super bowl XLVI (lyn)

I prepare for the Super Bowl by eating little.  I have only a lettuce, tomato and one- Laughing Cow Light piece of cheese for lunch. I am starving by 4:30; not a good sign.  I have an apple.

I get to the Super Bowl party that my friend Penny has gotten me invited to.  I have only met the hosts once or twice, but we have mutual friends.  They are lovely, and their apartment is huge and welcoming.  It is a perfect venue for a Super Bowl party, a million times better than mine would have been.  About fifty people show up, and it never feels crowded.  I sit in front of their gigantic big screen TV, and leave my seat only to get more food. 

I start with chips and dips (more than one of both) and then move on to spicy chicken wings.  Next I eat a tennis-ball -sized meatball in tomato sauce.  Delicious.  And finally, I have some baked ziti and lasagna.  I skip the healthy salad and pulled pork.  For dessert, I eat a piece of a flourless chocolate cake, a black and white cookie, and a football-topped cupcake.  The food is excellent but obscenely unhealthy.  Had I eaten nothing for the past week I still would have been over in points tonight.

The company is great.  I sit among mostly men, who help explain the game to me.  I get the basics, barely.  When a female joins us, the conversation briefly shifts to comments about:

• Tom Brady
• The weather:  “How come they are sweating?”  (The game is being played indoors in Indianapolis)
• The teams:  “What colors are the Giants?”

It is a thrilling game.  I watch with the intensity of a loyal fan, although I’m not.  But I love seeing Tom Brady and Eli Manning duke it out.  With minutes left in the game, the Giants score and then win, 21 to 17.

I walk the few blocks back to my apartment and horns are blaring, people are singing in the streets, and from one bar, I hear New York, New York being sung. It's another great night to call New York home.

found: a long lost friend (lyn)

In 1986, I was a senior Product Manager at Lever Brothers, working on Aim toothpaste.  Lever was introducing a revolutionary new product:  Extra Strength Aim; the Extra standing for Extra fluoride.  The divisional president had recently been hired from Johnson and Johnson, where he successfully launched Extra Strength Tylenol.  There, the Extra made sense.  In a toothpaste, as Borak might say, “not so much.”  Our Extra was more akin to Spinal Tap’s Nigel, whose revolutionary amplifier “goes to 11.”

Two assistant product managers worked for me.  One, a male, came from Gillette, and before that, was a ballet dancer.  He later went on to run Gap Marketing and Henri Bendel, the NYC department store.  He was also hysterically funny.  The other person was Lori, a smart, no-nonsense marketer.

Lever Brothers was located on Park Avenue, an easy walk from my apartment.  But a year or so after I was hired, Lever acquired Chesebrough-Ponds.  In a matter of weeks, we were all commuting to Greenwich Connecticut, about 35 miles from Manhattan. 

Lori had a car, and volunteered to be the driver.  That’s where we cemented our friendship.  Two hours a day in a car, much of it listening to George Michael’s Faith album, is what I remember most about that time.  When I left Chesebrough in 1988, Lori and I remained friends.

Lori is one of those people you would want in an emergency.  She is logical, resourceful, and uncannily calm, regardless of circumstance.  She is probably the most rational person I know.  Even with two young kids in a New York City apartment, Lori always had it together. The last time I saw her I was pregnant, and she had an infant son, and a two-year old daughter.   I remember looking to her for advice about motherhood.  I asked, for example, “How do you know if your baby needs more blankets?”  “You feel him; if he’s cold, he needs more blankets.”  That’s Lori.  Soon after, she moved to Westchester and we lost touch. 

In September I called Lori.  She and her husband both went to Cornell, met there, and now her two children are students there.  Tonight, after 19 years of not seeing each other, we are meeting at T-Bar for dinner.

Lori walks in and it’s immediately noticeable how much she hasn’t changed.  Same small frame, same dark hair, same youthful demeanor, and same energy.  It feels like no time at all has passed.  The food is excellent but is barely noticed.  What is noticed is the fun and friendship that is quickly resumed.  We reminisce; we catch-up; and we talk about our lives today.  Lori tells me that I look the same.  When I tell her I had gained and lost 40 pounds she says, “I can’t even picture that.”   And then adds,  “Really, if I were meeting you for the first time, I would think you were under 40.  Your skin looks great.”  Surely it must be the dim lighting, but now I definitely won't give up La Mer. 

Aside from geography, there was no reason why Lori left my life, but there are a million reasons why I want her back in it.   

a most spectacular dinner (lyn)

I wish I had the skills of a Frank Bruni or Ruth Reichl.  Maybe then I could describe the exquisite meal I had tonight at Café Boulud.

Abbey’s birthday is today.  Valerie thoughtfully invites me to join her, Abbey, Adam and Jason to celebrate.  I don’t give a lot of thought to what I’ll wear, as my winter-going-out wardrobe consists mostly of black skirts and a myriad of tops.  I choose comfortable boots (as I’ll be walking to the restaurant which is only 15 blocks away), a black Thakoon skirt, and my new off-white wrap wool top.  I look thin and good from the neck down. But despite some effort, my hair looks awful…flat and flyaway.

The restaurant is elegantly decorated, reflecting a contemporary, sleek design. Everyone is friendly and accommodating.  The wait staff at Telepan could learn a lot from the waiters here.

Except for the birthday-boy, we all order drinks.  I get a Cosmopolitan, and envy the ease at which my sister and her sons review, with knowledge, the wine list.  First comes the bread. I choose one slice of pumpkin something and an olive scone.  Then, a basket arrives with little fried risotto balls filled with black truffles. Each is a perfect combination of flavors.

This is a family of large, fit men.  We order big.  For starters, everyone gets an appetizer plus we order sides of two different pastas.  I get the steak tartare, and remember eating raw hamburger meat with my dad growing up.  That was before we knew of raw meat’s potential dangers, and yet we never got sick. But the steak tartare I eat tonight  is nothing like the one of my youth.  It is beautifully presented under some kind of smooth bread topping, and every mouthful is sumptuous and perfect. 

For my entrée, I choose the “pomegranate glazed duck breast with sweet potato, puffed barley, wild arugula toasted walnuts, natural jus.”  Adam debates between the Arctic Char and Sea Bass.  He chooses the latter based on the waiter’s answer to his question, “Which is bigger?”

The entrees are outstanding and they are presented as pieces of art.  I’ve never liked sweet potatoes, but after eating the ones that come with my duck, I may have to re-think my lifelong aversion to them.  Abbey even comments on the simple steamed spinach we order as a side.  “This may be the most perfectly prepared spinach I’ve ever eaten,” he says. 

We order four desserts for the table; all are amazing.  Even the cappuccino looks photo-ready with its perfectly capped foam.

Tonight will be remembered as much for the food as everything else. And the everything else is pretty spectacular too.

true story (lyn)

I am standing in my kitchen with an apple in my hand.  Out of nowhere it strikes me that:

• I am in good health
• My son is where he wants to be
• My family and friends are healthy (though my dad could be better)
• I am within two pounds of my ideal weight
• I live in the best city in the world
• I have a great opportunity to build a business, and hopefully make some decent money
• I have amazing friendships; most decades long
• All my clothes fit (except for that Donna Karan dress that I am still thinking about)
• I have no major stresses keeping me up at night
• I have a million good reasons to get up everyday

And there in my kitchen I wonder for the first time in a very long time, “Is this what happiness feels like?”  Yes, I think it is.

a restaurant week non-dinner (lyn)

I’m meeting Meredith for dinner.  It’s restaurant week and we’ve chosen Telepan, for its 3-course $35 dinner.  Neither one of us has ever been there, and Zagat has given it high ratings.  January ended yesterday and walking to the restaurant, I pass people eating outdoors.  Seeing them makes me wish for last year’s February 1, when we were digging out from a major blizzard.

Even though Meredith and I speak almost daily, we see each other rarely.  She lives far from me by city standards (upper west side) and has a puppy that doesn’t like to be left alone.  And though we share a membership to Manhattan Theater Club, we’ve had to skip going together to the first two plays this year.  So, having a nice dinner out is something we are both looking forward to.

Meredith arrives before me and is already seated, having a glass of wine, when I walk in.  We are handed menus.  I ask if the menus include the $35, 3-course special.  “No, I’m sorry, but we only participate in the restaurant-week special during lunch,” says our snippy waiter, apparently hating me for asking.  I can tell. Now what do we do?  We must have missed the just-lunch notation.  It’s an expensive restaurant. But we are seated, and Meredith is already drinking an $18 glass of wine.  While we are debating what to do, a new person suddently appears at our table.  In his hand is a small printed pamphlet of the restaurants participating in restaurant week; he shoves it down in front of us. I’m guessing that somewhere in this pamphlet is proof of Telepan's lunch-only participation.  As if we asked for proof!  This person, it turns out, is not the maître d, or even the owner, but rather another waiter coming to help out his friend.  Meredith and I are simply the hapless recipients of an offensive grand gesture.

Despite our waiter and his friend, we decide to stay.  For an appetizer, we split an excellent house-smoked brook trout on a buckwheat-potato blini and black radish sour cream.  We both get a complicated-sounding but delicious-tasting roasted chicken (over brussel sprouts, egg pasta, poppy seeds and crème fraiche).  We skip dessert.

In the end, I’m glad we stayed.  As we are saying good night, we both realize how foolish it is to see each other so infrequently.  Once a month, at least, we will get together.  Even when it’s not restaurant week.

fake winter (lyn)

February first.  60 degrees.  What happened to winter?  No snow.  Few low temperatures.  Heavy winter coats unused.  Cashmere sweaters all but abandoned.  Awful, really.  I miss getting all bundled up.  I love the feeling of frigid air against my face.  I prefer my bedroom being ice cold.  I look forward to snuggling under warm blankets.  Now I go to sleep with my air conditioner on. 

At least if it were treacherous weather I’d have a good excuse for not exercising; in this weather I have none.