Forever Patience

You mind if we talk about food again?   I certainly don’t want to talk about all the emails I sent nor the latest indignities our nation has suffered at the hands of our commander in chief.  When you look back over a day and consider what might be worth capturing all the time in front of screens, feels like a void.  Food lodges itself in a different part of the brain.

Dinner.  My wife is insanely busy with an event she is the M.C. for at the kids school.  And I know that yesterday I cleared out whatever was left in the fridge to make dinner.  The call comes and the ask is made and I am ready:  No, I’m not going to say, are you crazy, there’s nothing here.  “Let me order burritos.  I’ll get them and have them for you guys when you come back.  You want one?  You gonna have time to eat here?”

Almost certainly no one will object.  When we’re done, no one will still be hungry.  I look up the place on line.  Find the familiar logo and give them a ring.  In my most casual, confident Mandarin, I begin: “Hey, so I’m over at ladeedah and I’d like four burritos. “Lideedah?  Never heard of it.”  “Not lideedah.  Ladeedah.”  “Huh?  Hey Fred.  We got a foreigner.  Have you heard of Ladeedah?”  In the distance: “Nope. What?  Does he mean Leedeedah?”  “Hey, hey, hey, hello, hello?  No.  Lah Lah Lah, lah dee dah.  I’m right across the street from you guys.  Lahdeedah.  Come on!” 

Looking back at the web site I can see now that I’ve dialed the taqueria outlet located down town, near Liang Ma Qiao.  They’d have no idea what I was talking about.  There isn’t much left to do but hang up.  I dial again, now to the one near me and, as I’d expected, they know precisely where Lahdeedah is.  They take my order, four veggie burritos, and promise to swing it over within forty minutes.   Patience.  Patience John, when communicating in this adopted home.  Forever patience.  Humility. 

Later it is made clear to me that I should have left the default sour cream off the older ones and should never allow hot sauce of any kind on the younger one’s order.  “I thought you guys would be psyched.”  Regardless, they’re all eaten in the end.

Tuesday, 2/06/18