At a loss
When I arrived at work today, the giant Colombian food runner told me that one of my co-workers had died. Which I thought was a sick bit of kidding, but kidding none the less.
No. He died in his sleep, no one knows why. He was 34 years old.
He'd worked at the restaurant for eight years, was one of the "core" waiters. He was one of two people allowed to have a shift drink at the end of the night. He was 34 years old. He'd survived being hit by a cab a few years ago. The only things that saved him were his level of intoxication (he was very relaxed) and the fact that his face absorbed the shock of the windshield instead of his brain.
He was one of the people that I looked forward to seeing when I went to work. We'd have long conversations about all sorts of lofty topics. We'd have to stop mid-sentence with a "Hold that thought," while we went to check on our tables. He told me about his girlfriend troubles, I'd talk about Lindsay. He'd get me to listen to segments of 40 minute long three-note-songs. I got him to try a martini made with scotch instead of vermouth. We would order in from Zen Palate if the family meal was too much to bear. He's just the kind of guy who would call in sick by faking his own death. But if that were the case, he would have placed the call himself.
I didn't hang out with him outside of work save the occasional after work drinking session. But I liked him, and gravitated toward him. I thought about him today, long before I'd heard the news, as something I was doing reminded me of conversations we'd had. I was listening to NPR at the time; a story about the spread of Catholicism in the Global South. "Africans relate to the Bible because it is full of stories about the transience of life," the correspondent read, "How you never know for sure that you will be here tomorrow."
I'm aghast, dismayed, sad, and nothing that I've written is adequate to describe it.
No. He died in his sleep, no one knows why. He was 34 years old.
He'd worked at the restaurant for eight years, was one of the "core" waiters. He was one of two people allowed to have a shift drink at the end of the night. He was 34 years old. He'd survived being hit by a cab a few years ago. The only things that saved him were his level of intoxication (he was very relaxed) and the fact that his face absorbed the shock of the windshield instead of his brain.
He was one of the people that I looked forward to seeing when I went to work. We'd have long conversations about all sorts of lofty topics. We'd have to stop mid-sentence with a "Hold that thought," while we went to check on our tables. He told me about his girlfriend troubles, I'd talk about Lindsay. He'd get me to listen to segments of 40 minute long three-note-songs. I got him to try a martini made with scotch instead of vermouth. We would order in from Zen Palate if the family meal was too much to bear. He's just the kind of guy who would call in sick by faking his own death. But if that were the case, he would have placed the call himself.
I didn't hang out with him outside of work save the occasional after work drinking session. But I liked him, and gravitated toward him. I thought about him today, long before I'd heard the news, as something I was doing reminded me of conversations we'd had. I was listening to NPR at the time; a story about the spread of Catholicism in the Global South. "Africans relate to the Bible because it is full of stories about the transience of life," the correspondent read, "How you never know for sure that you will be here tomorrow."
I'm aghast, dismayed, sad, and nothing that I've written is adequate to describe it.
posted by christopher at 1:51 AM
1 Comments:
sweetheart, i'm so terribly sorry about the sadness and the fact that he's gone. saying so doesn't feel like much, but i'm thinking of you all the time.
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