Suburban Anarchy
A Guide to Conquering Allergy Season.
At the start of 2023, I decided to journey out of town for a 3-day reset. Not just any reset. I was going to hike some small mountain and stay at a hotel in a suburban shopping strip.
Adventurous. I know.
Free Time
I ended up reaching my destination sooner than expected, so went ahead and made the hike to watch the sunset. Lovely.
What this did was totally free up my Saturday.
So, I wake up late to watch some Olympic women’s swimming, while thinking about how I’m going to conquer the day.
Then my TV shuts off and won’t come back on. I ring the front desk and they send an engineer up.
Thirty minutes later they send another engineer up.
Another 30 minutes later and I’m making my way to the lobby bar.
“How many engineers does it take to fix a TV?”
Guess we’ll never know.
The Suppressed
It was NFL Wildcard Weekend, so figured the lobby restaurant/bar was where I needed to be.
There’s like 5 people here, including the bartender.
It’s perfect.
Then she came strutting in. Jet black hair, black peacoat, polished & presentable. She was stunning. Extremely high fashion in what I can only call Super Hero Boots. Knee-high, burgundy leather with gold accents. They were pretty awesome.
She positioned herself at a far off table directly behind me.
Then it started.
She coughed.
Then another.
Then another.
What is this a doctor’s office?
I turn around to offer her a loose cough drop out of my vest pocket, because I’m a grandma and accustomed to itchy throats during mood swinging allergy season.
She shakes her head, NO, in decline.
I get it. Don’t take candy or cough drops from strangers.
Four coughs later, I get up out of my barstool and head straight to the hotels mini-market that’s a few feet away.
I pick up two packs of Halls Cherry and tell the host at the front desk to put it on my room. One for The Serial Cougher and one for myself, since I was already there.
I walk over to The Serial Cougher and place it on her table.
She looked away from her phone and nodded like a thanks, but could tell she was shocked that somebody had the audacity to do something like that.
I return to my barstool to enjoy the rest of the late afternoon games. Peacefully.
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Musical Chairs
A few quarters go by, and I decide to walk around outside to stretch the ol’ legs and get some fresh air.
I returned to find my previous seat occupied.
So, I position myself on another side of the bar.
I feel a light tap on my shoulder, look to my left, and it’s The Serial Cougher.
She now has a guy with her.
She introduces me to him as “The Guy that bought me cough drops.”
He doesn’t look too thrilled and I immediately sensed something was off. I remove myself from whatever she was trying to manufacture by relocating to another available seat at the corner end of the bar.
Worked out because I was closer to a TV.
After my solo game of musical chairs I noticed how dark it was outside and I started feeling a rumbly in my tumbly. I already ate here the night before so, wanted something else.
I was in the process of closing my tab when The Serial Cougher strolled over and planted herself directly in front of me. I didn’t even know where she came from; I thought she had left the bar entirely.
She introduces herself and apologizes for being “off-putting earlier”.
I shrug and tell her how much I like her boots.
She’s like “Thanks! They’re vintage Dolce & Gabbana” then she performed a little twirl.
This girl is truly beautiful, but seemed like a lot of work. I was very familiar with her type and knew the emotional price tag that came with this sort of aura.
It’s work and I’m off the clock.
I look up from her impromptu fashion show and this woman walking in catches my eye.
Trunk Show
Skinny black jeans. White puffy jacket. And totally messed up sandy blonde hair from the wind blowing it around.
Something about her told me this is the person I should be entertaining right now. Can’t say what, she just looked effortlessly frazzled.
I excused myself from The Lil’ Miss Vintage Trunk Show and made my way towards Miss Marshmallow Jacket.
“Hi, I’m headed out to find dinner. Would you like to join me?”
“Can you tie my boot?” She asked.
Up All Night
Evening air was nice and crisp, so we wandered around and settled on an Irish Pub.
Was pretty crowded, but we were immediately seated, which made me very happy.
She was staying at the same hotel, because she was moving out of state and her whole life was packed up in a U-Haul.
She had a friend helping her move that was back in their room.
She also had a boyfriend who was supposed to be there too, but he completely bailed.
She was funny, charming, and had the kind of carefree spirit I wish I possessed some days.
She had a positive outlook on things. Not just because she was successful or pretty, but because she refused to let anything bring her down.
She was hopeful about her future and confident about her decision to move states.
My being there to reset & relax was an extreme contrast to her life-altering state, but we balanced each other out.
I told her about the cough drop situation and she said, “well I’m glad you invited me instead. And thanks for tying my boot.”
Then followed it up with
“Keep being cool and you’ll get lucky.”
