Sandwich and chips

Wait. Was I really this late eating lunch because of a pedagogy workshop that ended with a guided meditation during which I was asked to think of myself all alone, disconnected from culture and politics and religion, attached piggyback to a tiny grain of sand at the bottom of a volcano that, through heat and compression and violent chaos, was transformed into a beautiful amethyst?

 

Veggie sandwich, chips, and a chocolate

A package came for you said S. as she hurried out and I hurried in with my sadpants lunch. What magical words! I knew that A. had received her Metro thank you chocolates yesterday, and now here were mine. I inhaled my sandwich and chips. Then I washed my hands. I pulled the tape from the shipping container. I rustled down through the nested paper and grabbed the gold box. I lifted it out and placed it on my desk, on top of a bunch of files. I read the thank you note and pinned it to my bulletin board. I pulled on either side of the blue ribbon. I lifted the lid. I cut the plastic wrapper with my scissors. (Okay, B.’s scissors, but she never asked for them back.) I threw away the enclosed nutrition information without looking at it. I chose the chocolate that was shaped like a little diamond, covered in some kind of crumbled nut fairy dust that was on the inside too. Like a present! Like an honest-to-goodness present!

 

Turkey sandwich, salad and chips

Would we feral nextgen librarians be bold enough to cut the line and make sensible double use of the conference sandwich table? Would we be that wild and irreverent? Turned out to be no, A., J., J., and I standing at the back of the line until a member of the graying class sent us around, I guess I’m better at following directions. I was a little scared about having to sit up at the front and talk after we ate, so I ate very little, distractedly, and was too late to get a cookie before the staff took away the plateful of crumbs. Lucky me there were cupcakes later.

 

Veggie sandwich plus chips

Since the time of Aristotle, I have learned so far this semester, the question of audience has been central to the theory and practice of the rhetorician. By using his common language and appealing to his emotions, the orator had a better shot at being persuasive in the (limited) democratic square. So as I stood in line for the semester’s first hapless descent into Quizno’s I pondered the informational hang tags that had been affixed incorrectly to the sneeze guard, unwittingly compelling me to upsell myself the sandwich + chips or cookie + drinks combo and  illustrating the correct cap placement for the ranch dressing press. Oh, to peer behind the curtain, to see the inner workings of my six inch veggie on wheat with honey mustard no guac!

 

Portobello sandwich, chips and guacamole, and a beer

Nothing works up appetites for panini like contemporary art. By the time L. and I had seen as much as we could bear (though we each liked some of it, these piles of green balloons rustling inside plastic bags, frozen pigments that melted into sworls on cardstock) I was almost too hungry, which made the very slow service a challenge to harmony. Do I only notice this now that I’m rich beyond my wildest imaginings, poor waiter service? L. knew I was past my patience about twelve seconds before I did (I’ve known you for awhile, said L.) and was already rustling about for something disracting and shiny when I began to whimper with complaint. We played tic tac toe. The sandwiches were pretty great, when they came.

 

Mushroom veggie burger sandwich, plus chips

So, how do you know J.? asked B. as we left the bagel store (where I purchased a supplementary bag of chips to go with my from-home sandwich; was kinda needing a pick-me-up), and we ran right smack into her. What timing! We walked together to the park and grabbed a bench and sat down and talked collaboration and publication and working conditions and B. told us all about how K. gave birth in the hallway and there was a model shoot going on the entire time, a guy in a suit jacket and matching shorts walking arm in arm with a woman wearing bright green, walking an orange vintage bicycle. They kept stopping every now and again and shifting positions, pretending to talk to each other, at one point she hopped up awkwardly on the bike frame while the photographer snapped away. We figured it was for Time Out New York–who else would be shooting such bright young colorful things? A passel of teenagers came running through from Brooklyn Tech, maybe the cross country team?

 

Cheese and tomato sandwich, chips and guacamole

Confirming my longstanding belief that the avocado is the finest oblong food ever in the history of the world, L. made guacamole in a bowl at the picnic table, supplying us with fresh food with enough fat to satisfy the part of me that was suffering a little into day three of no donuts. Seriously delicious. As I reached idly for a tourist map of the area, hand permanently jammed inside the chip bag, L. said, You could cut cheese for the sandwiches. Oh all right.

 

Reuben, plus chips

Next to the word reuben on the menu, in italics so you knew they meant it, was the phrase house favorite. I looked at the walls, covered with animal heads, a deer and a bear and some sort of sea creature, maybe a shark, and the patrons, all men bellied up to the bar, one with a golden retriever panting at his feet, and opted to go with the house. It arrived open-faced on the plate, covered with sauerkraut, thousand island, melted swiss, a slice of dark pumpernickel lightly toasted underneath. I think I’ve eaten that reuben a thousand times in my life. L. got the chicken caesar salad, F. the buffalo chicken wrap special. We all agreed we were hungrier than we realized.

 

Veggie sandwich, plus chips

Ordered at Quizno’s. Ate in cloffice with door closed. Stared blankly at paper that isn’t writing itself. Waited for you to be funny on Facebook. Daydreamed about drinking a beer and reading a novel and going swimming and eating s’mores and looking at stars and holding hands. Wished feeding myself well wasn’t the thing that invariably gets dropped off the list when I’m in the thick of finishing things.

 

Veggie sandwich, plus chips

I hit a wall. Sometimes you hit a wall. I went downstairs. I ordered a sandwich. I called K. on the phone. I sat outside at a metal table under an umbrella and ate a sandwich. K., I hit a wall. As we talked on the phone a gaggle of students walked by giggling and gaggling and being brand new and just eighteen and one of them shouted Hey, library-teacher-lady! I have a citation question! If I want to make a citation where do I go, to Google-What? She was laughing, making everybody laugh. Google-What? I answered incredulously, It’s not all on Google! A little more patter, she ran on to keep up with her friends, skipping along like she couldn’t even see the wall at all, not for a minute, anyway.