...Please don't go, we'll eat you up we love you so...

My reflections on the passing of Maurice Sendak, beloved children's author, can be found on the Times of Israel website:

http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/please-dont-go-well-eat-you-up-we-love-you-so/

After Party

בס"ד

It was Saturday night, and I was tired. Aaron, one of my best friends, had gotten married a few days prior to my late shift. A lot of time that had been set aside for school work had been relocated for the various preparations we had taken upon ourselves for his wedding. This in turn had resulted in losing an incredible amount of time that had been relegated for sleep. Since Thursday morning, the (in)famous DZ and NZ and myself had been hanging out with each other and Aaron in various combinations. Good food, better spirits, and a great time were had by all, but by the time the Motzei Shabbat late shift rolled around, my eyelids were being held open by Olympian will and my liver was still processing the large, high-quality quantities of Thursday’s nuptial cheer.

Which is why at 2:30 in the morning, when I found myself completing the liter of beer I had started two glasses ago, I had to cock an eyebrow at myself. But it was late, and if I was going to be hanging out alone with the taps for another hour and a half, I was going to make the most out of it. For a brief second it had crossed my mind that drinking alone is the first sign of alcoholism, but hey, I’m a professional.

Relative for a Saturday night, business had hit a hard lull- especially considering the perfect jacket weather outside. An hour so before, DZ and NZ had returned for a wedding after-party (sans bride and groom), but since their departure the Slow had really begun to live up to its name. A few other friends of mine had stopped in and then decided it was too late to drink, leaving five minutes after arriving, and taking the last of the customers with them.

Candles from the empty tables cast small flickering shadows on the red walls, and the chairs stood silently, empty skeletons aglow in the permanent dusk of the quiet pub. Moshe forbids us to close before the official closing time (4am weekend, 3am regular days), but I try to leave as soon as the display blinks with the appropriate time, so I began to do whatever I could to hasten the end of the shift. While wiping down the assortment of mismatched café tables, dreaming of cute girls from the wedding and trying to gauge bothmy feelings and chances, my 100 strong “bar appropriate” playlist continued its lengthy shuffle.

Soon, Sublime attacked the stereo with “What I Got”. I shoot a glance around the bar and out onto the street. Empty. The soft acoustic beginning rolled into the song’s famous reggae-rap, and my body, sore and well-worn from the celebration of new love and new life, began to move of its own accord. Nobody was around to interfere, to be stepped on or bumped into. I pranced around the larger area of the bar, in the large aisle that separates tables 9, 10, 11, 12 (whose placement on the computer screen changes every night), breaking moves and popping with the beat. Legs crossed with knees bent, propelling my body with a quick jump. Front leg, back leg, an Irish jig of a shuffle moving me from one end of the small room to the other.

The bar became my ball room, the canvas for my redefinition of movement. With a kick and push, I challenged the wall’s dancing shadows with my creativity. Alone in the Slow, the complex emotions of the week released themselves through my legs for five minutes before I forced myself to stop- I preferred not to sweat into the pints I might have had to pour with the entrance of a last minute customer. But Good Lord in Heaven, I had never danced so well.