Single Parenting

The sight of two well-dressed single moms out for dinner in an upscale restaurant on a Saturday night seemed to send little beads of sweat dancing upon the Maitre d’s brow and had the coiffed clientele fanning themselves with the wine list.   It must have been sensory overload. 

Denise* and I, both divorced, were out celebrating my 42nd birthday. I wasn’t dating anyone with whom I cared to share my birthday, but that didn’t mean no celebration. I’d worked hard to be present and accounted for in a life sans-a-man, which for me is like being Sans-A-Belt, only not made of polyester.  It’s a style of being that lets me breathe and look my best without being pinched or having to hold it all together.  But in my case, it is tres chic and does not involve white shoes.
 
Denise and I we were both anxious to get in on the latest trend of the wrap-around porch style salad bar and have faux Brazilian cowboys dropping beef on our plates, no pun intended.  Though surely just pricey masquerades for the all-you-can-eat Sizzler of our youth, we were intrigued to see, and taste the hullabaloo.  We were women and we were roaring – or maybe it was our stomachs growling. Nevertheless we were ready to have a good meal, good wine and a good time. 

We arrived on time for our reservation, perhaps even a bit overdressed, were greeted by the manager, and gave her our name.

“Oh,”  she said. 

She looked at me.  She looked at Denise.  She looked again.  What were we? Playing tennis? 

“Are you waiting for the rest of your party?”

“No, we left the men at home,” Denise offered.

“It’s just two?” she finally asked. 

You’d have thought we up and slaughtered the cows, and chickens and pigs ourselves and stomped in and slammed them on the counter, demanding payment.

We then, in turn, looked at each other.  No spinach between the teeth.  We looked good.

“Yes,” we said in unison. “Just two.”   I leaned over the podium and pointed to the page and spot where Denise’s own name was clearly marked in the 7pm line with a very legible numeral two.  What? They thought we weren’t coming?

A short conference, audible sigh and shoulder shrug later, we were handed off to Hostess Tiffany* who led us to our table in the back of the restaurant, following and passing many empty tables before us.  We were seated at the outside of a table set for four.

“Just two, right?” Hostess Tiffany muttered.

“Yes”, we laughed, “just two”.

The busboy came over, smiling, with a pitcher of water. 

“Just two?”  he asked, already knowing the answer.  I gave the go-ahead for Denise to have a turn at this herself.

“Yes indeed,” she said, “Just two!”

He nodded, said something in Spanish, or perhaps it was much more authentic Portuguese, and clinked and clanked the additional silverware plates and glasses from our midst perhaps annoyed that merely moments before he had meticulously set the table for four. 

Our server came by to explain how we flipped the little icon if we wanted more protein on our plates, and how the gaucho-clad waiters would simply come around and serve us.  We simply needed to ravage the salad bar.

“And it’s just two, right?”

“Right”, we said. We were obviously the talk of the wait staff.

We needed to take a shuttle to the salad bar but were impressed with the selection.  On our way we passed tables of twelve, six, eight and yes, two.  But none were tables of just women.  This concept was obviously some macho secret club where women were supposed to be accompanied by a testosterone toting chaperone.  We dared to be two women alone on a Saturday night, primed to eat beef.

We prevailed.  We ate, we talked, we drank.  The waiters came and went and we didn’t know, or care, if they thought we were an odd couple that night. 

Many tasty tidbits later, we left the restaurant as we had entered it, just two.  Yes, we had some pains in our stomach, but not from too much meat, from too much good girlfriend laughter amidst the absurdity of being thought absurd.

During our departure we passed by tables and saw food we had never been offered.  It didn’t make it to the back of the back room?  We paid full price. Perhaps they didn’t think we were hungry or wanted to taste those baby lamp chops?  They’d have gone nicely with the Pinot we were drinking.  The garlic filet mignon? That would certainly have tickled our palate. 

But it was time to go.  Our humor and friendship overrode the insensibilities.

We’ll never know if they thought the reservation for two was a joke, or if they were really put off by two women eating together, alone.  They had no way to know the party of two wouldn’t be a man and a woman — or two men — or women who were a couple.  This was not a ladies night; we paid the same price two ‘big and tall’ men would have paid.  Yet, we were paid little if any attention and felt slighted in the constant undercurrent noting our lack of numerical prowess.

A few months later I took my family to a similar restaurant to celebrate birthdays, graduations and anniversaries.  I knew my teenage son and his friends would love the idea of getting more simply with the tip of their hand, so to speak.  I knew my parents and friends would enjoy the wall-to-wall windows, wine selection and trendy expanse.  Ok, it might not have been Saturday night, but there I was — a single gal with a party of nine at an extended table in a premier location right near the salad bar, no shuttle needed.

The baby lamb chops? They were delicious.  And yes, I had more than just two.

*names have been changed

Do you think being single makes you more self conscious?