I’ve been thinking a lot about anniversaries this week. Exactly a year ago today I retired from full-time working-mom life. (Doesn’t that sound so much more empowering than…”Exactly a year ago I was let go” or “Exactly a year ago Cookie folded.”) The staff drowned its sorrows at Scratcher in the East Village, which just so happens to be the bar where Andy and I clinked two bourbons-on-the-rocks* to finish off our anniversary celebration last night. It was half a block from the restaurant where we ate dinner (Degustation [1]. Please go.), a coincidence I decided was too good a memory-mining opportunity to miss. Memory-mining, in case you can’t tell, is sport in my house. Unlike my forward-thinking friend Jenny, who once told me dinners out with her husband usually involve him asking “So what’s our five-year plan?”, I am always looking for a good occasion to ask things like “Can you name all the restaurants where we’ve celebrated the past 13 anniversaries?” (We came up with about six — the rest are recorded in my Diary [2] or scribbled inside the restaurant matchbooks that I used to collect.) On almost every one of these nights, the waiter would approach us at some point during the meal with a message: Your wine tonight is courtesy of your parents. Or Your champagne tonight is courtesy of Aunt Patty [3] and Uncle Julian. (That was technically our engagement dinner, and the cork above, dated 12/15/96 with a ballpoint pen, is from the bottle we popped that night.) And then there was the dinner at Babbo in 1999 that I will never forget — when the entire check was picked up by a friend for whom Andy had just done a favor. Every single time this happens, I am blown away by the gesture — whether it’s a glass of champagne or dessert or the whole meal — blown away by the fact that someone took the time to find our where we were going then call ahead to conspire with a host. Whenever possible, we try to do it right back.
*I love how cool I sound here, but the reality is, Andy and the bartender had to convince me to nut up and have my own glass of Michter’s. But I just had two Albarinos! Maybe I’ll just have a sip of yours. We have to get up early! Just give me half a glass…OK, fine, the whole glass. You’re getting Phoebe on the early bus.