Single in the restaurant

Oh the absolute tyranny! Why does the world expect us to arrive, partner in tow, to an eating joint? If I needed a nice place to converse I would find me a park, thank you very much. I can't believe people would want to share their dining space with friends and better-halfs who take forever to order (and then order not enough) while one can't wait to wolf down anything in sight.

Due to varied reasons (absence of better half, few friends, and a long litany of other woes) I often find myself, quite happily I may add, alone on a nice table in a restaurant, cafe, food court, what have you. And I always have a great time!

But people who sit next to me, on other tables I mean, would not let me be in peace. They eye me like an eagle, my fellow diners, and I can read their minds racing to figure out the sad history of me, the lone eater.

Yes, people are always in groups, and yes the group composition is widely catholic. There's mother and daughter, girlfriends, boys, young couple with unwieldy child, and of course, the ubiquitous eyelash-fluttering boyfriend and girlfriend.

But no, back to me. So it starts with the usher asking me "Table for?", expecting to find more people emerging from the lift/staircase/my pocket. When I reply "Just me," a tincture of aghast-ness flashes in their eyes before they regain their sense of balance and say, not surly but not entirely happy with this near sociopath in front of them, "This way, Sir."

And then of course, one repeats the same rigmarole inside the restaurant, letting waiters, the bathroom attendant (why him?) and the cashier know that yes, you are willfully following singledom in a world of twos and threes and that you refuse to feel stifled about it, thank you very much.

And I do love my solitary dinners. I have something going on with restaurant lights. The mish-mash of small, roof-engraved bulbs strikes in me sensations of such pleasing beatitude that indeed, I imagine I am under the influence of such mind-altering substance. Happiness!

There is also the conversation -- with the waiters, I mean. Shorn of trying to impress fellow diners, one can wax eloquent in all manner of informality with the dashingly handsome men who purvey eatables to and from the kitchen. Is it me, or is there a quiet revolution taking over India's restaurants? Where have all these Greek Gods come from?

And of course, the polite "Excuse me"-s and the gentle, "Can I have that in change please?" bless the evening further, and before you know it, you are smiling all the way to the exit.

Wait, I think I am getting late for dinner -- me, myself, and some magic!