quality not quantity

The comfort I get from this apartment is unparalleled by any other place I've lived. Never have I felt more peaceful in a home than here, in the late morning after the roommates have all trudged to their jobs. Walk into the living room and you will find me sitting in the corner between two windows with just the sunlight, the sound of children playing outside and my laptop. It's not a big room nor a big apartment. But, it's quality not quantity.

I leave it occasionally. Yesterday I left to finally retrieve my Time magazine from Isaac at Pennyfeathers Cafe. He is a pleasant man with a childlike innocence that sparkles when he greets the guests. I arrived at the end of his shift and after he handed me the magazine, he informed me he was going to go home with a grilled cheese sandwich and head straight to bed. He would, however, love to have dinner with me on one of his days off. I agreed to it immediately. This would be my first dinner proposition of the day. Red letter!

I sat in "my" corner table after Isaac left and sipped a cranberry juice he comped me. I tried to focus on Heart of Darkness but had difficulty with the thick, archaic language and colloquialisms. The soft sponge of a brain required to bend to literary classics is no longer contained within me. I like my books short and modern. But Heart of Darkness is only a hundred or so pages you say, you erudite knaves. 'Tis. 'Tis approximately one hundred dense pages of what I endeavor to understand is a story told almost like a stream of consciousness by an old man on a boat. I'm supposed to watch Apocalypse Now too for the book club. My avoidance is completely collegiate.

Molly rang at 6ish and I met her in Brooklyn for a freezing night's adventure. We first stopped at Mullanes Bar and Grill where we snacked on sweet potato fries. It's a big space with dark wood and the promise of loud, raucous Saturday nights. This was a quiet Tuesday of few patrons and newspapers strewn about the bar. Our caravan included Molly's boyfriend, the food stylist and his wife. We were met by a sixth at Di Fara.

Oft-reviewed and completely hyped, the small green room was thick with hungry people and smoke. Domenico De Marco is a small man with a spine curved to his countertop. I don't think that he will ever straighten himself or that he would ever want to. I mean, he makes pizza all day, may the process do to one's body what it do! We ordered our pizza a little after 8:45pm and stood about for the next hour waiting for it. Mr. De Marco makes each pizza by hand. This means throwing the dough, ladling the sauce, shaving the fresh mozzarella, adding the toppings, firing the pizza in the oven which only holds about 4 at a time, removing the pizza when it's done and cutting fresh basil, which he grows himself, onto it with a pair of scissors before rolling the pizza cutter through the finished artisanal product. What you taste is a soft crust with a gentle sauce and fresh cheese that makes you wonder why Italians ever leave Italy. You taste the time each ingredient spends in Mr. De Marco's floury, rough hands. He pours olive oil from a teapot onto each pie in slow, caring swirls before he sends it away like a parent dropping off his child at school. Half or even a quarter of Mr. De Marco's dedication would yield a very different world were we each to adopt a bit of his work ethic. Take the trouble, spend the time, find the best parts to render your sum a result of which to be proud. Imagine the toys from China!

I encountered more attempts at perfection when I arrived at Pegu Club and was treated to an Earl Grey MarTEAni. Gin infused with bergamot, a little bit of egg and lemon zest in a small glass became one of the most amazing drinks I've ever had in my limited experience in the adult world of alcohol appreciation. It was a friendly, mildly sweet mixture made smooth by the egg which does something to bind the alcohol to the rest of the elements. A silver martini, it's called. I call it a drink so delicious that for the first time I understood how people become shitfaced without realizing it. I used to think it was impossible to find an alcoholic libation completely disguised in flavor but I was 2 sheets to the wind off of one martini.

Despite the aid of firewater, the conversation was animated and educational. Mr. Z was in town from L.A. and I met his friends J.J. and Henry, both insanely smart individuals and each with a gentility not found often anymore. When I reached to shake Henry's hand, he remained distant and said apologetically, "I don't shake hands. Germs." He gets enough microbes from his children. I told him I understood and suggested we shake our bodies in unison. He was seated so I shook for the both of us. J.J. complimented my sweater, a Rebecca Taylor cashmere shrug purchased at a thrift store in San Diego for $30. The compliment was not simply a "looks nice" type of pedestrian aside, it was a full discussion of the yarn, the buttons, the craftsmanship and the purl instead of knit stitching. A straight man who understands these subtle differences is rare. I may build J.J. a shrine. In the meantime, he invited me to dinner with his wife and daughter at a restaurant called Buddha Bodai which he claims has the best vegetarian Chinese food in the city. The anticipation consumes me.

Mr. Z, his colleague and I hopped a cab and headed uptown. After dropping them at their hotels, the cabbie and I continued to Harlem. Along the way up Central Park West, we chatted pleasantly about Senegal and L.A., our respective origins and the unfamiliar winter cold. The cabbie gave me career advice and as he delivered me to my destination, asked me if I wanted to go to a club or to dinner. I declined as any man who asks me to go to a club is not the man for me. I told him I was a quiet person and preferred places of a lesser volume.

Gastronomically, today was a day of quality and a lesson in the attempt at and success of creating a bite or sip of perfection. All told, I was asked to dinner three times. Each time by a man I didn't want to smooch. As dates go, today was a day of quantity.