How The Name Of This Blog Came About

Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York

It was on my second trip to New York to visit Marie that the name for this blog came about. It was my last night in town before I flew back to Austin the next morning. Marie came home to find me on the couch in the dark. She asked me if I was okay. I was fine I said, just a little hungover from the night before, sweating the spirits out, not wanting to go back home.
I'd missed my flight the night before as we'd gotten drunk in Manhattan at The Gramercy Park Hotel drinking Bohemian Sidecars that I'd ordered like Tequilla shots in Mexico not bothering to check the price of each one that turned out to be $15 a pop. I'd learned my lesson about ordering drinks in Manhattan - I shouldn't do it.

I was feeling sad about leaving her again. I was in love. I knew that for sure. And when I'd come back to the apartment the night before after missing my flight to find her in the kitchen cooking me dinner and crying I knew that she was in love too.

She said to get up that she had a friend who she hadn't seen in years who was having a going away dinner around the corner and that we were going, that she'd treat.

The guy's name was Francoise. He was from South Africa. He was friend's with Marie's second ex-husband (not technically ex as they still weren't divorced after 7 years, but close enough for me), and he and Marie were born on the same day. There were around ten to twelve people that'd showed up at a low lit place only a few blocks from Marie's apartment. After introductions were made we ordered food and drinks and joined in on some conversation that revolved mainly around film making, as Francoise was a filmmaker, and so were some of the others. The setting and the conversation were all very New York to me and seemed a long way from the usual absurd and over the top drug and alcohol stories that seemed to dominate my life and conversations in Austin.

At some point during the night when people started to clear out her friend Francoise came over to us and gave us his undivided attention as a few of the others that were left talked on the other side of the table. After a few minutes of talking he looked at me then looked at Marie and said that it was obvious that we were in love. He looked at us again then asked Marie how long we'd been dating or seeing each other, or what it was were doing? And I laughed as I knew what was coming - Marie did not like "us" and whatever the fuck it was that we were doing to be classified in any way. He looked at me as I laughed. I shrugged my shoulders. I wasn't going to touch it. It was a sore spot with Marie. I'd been through it in our short time together. I'd often made the mistake, out of habit, of referring to her as my "girlfriend" to which she would turn on me scornfully and say in her French huff, "Oh, I am not you're girlfriend." So I shut up and looked at Francoise and shrugged my shoulders again and smiled, looking at Marie. I liked putting her on the spot with Francoise. I wanted to see her squirm a little. She blushed, and slightly annoyed by it all said, "We'll I'm doing it. Whatever it is. I'm doing it..." And I said triumphantly that it was settled. She was the girl that I was doing in New York. Francoise and I laughed. Marie rolled her eyes as usual. And it was settled.

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