The Barmaid Blog™: Life for a 20-something Manhattan Barmaid

It's a couple of Thursdays ago, and while most of the people in the Bar are watching the Yankees walk all over the Kansas City Royals, I've got one television tuned to college hockey. It's not even really for me, though I'm watching when I have the chance; it's for Will. It's the first time he's been back here since Samantha died, and we're all naturally worried about him. But for the moment, he's sitting at the bar talking to Mario, and Maya - Samantha's friend, and the reason she started coming here and met Will in the first place - is mostly just standing there and listening to him. Simone and I are taking up the slack willingly.

Notre Dame is playing Michigan in the national men's hockey semifinals, and they've jumped out to a 3-0 lead. Will has said in the past that he doesn't really care that much about Michigan's hockey team, even though he played on their football team, but it's the reason he's supposedly here, and he keeps shaking his head as things look bleaker and bleaker. During the second intermission, after Michigan has finally made a game of it by scoring two in a row, Will asks me a question I'd sort of been hoping wouldn't come up. But I suppose if it was to come up at all, it's best coming from him, because the main reason I wasn't going to talk about it was not to rub it in his face. "How's things with you and Jenny?"

"They're good, thanks. We've been spending a lot of nights together." Maya slips off to serve some customers so that I can stick around and talk for a while.

"Is it love?" he asks, the second reason I was going to avoid the subject.

"I have no idea, Will." And that's the honest truth. "But whatever it is, it feels very good."

"Okay, I'm - listen, I'm only going to say this once, but I'm sorry, there's just no way I can let it go without saying it at all, it's just who I am... can I, uh... please come over and watch it feeling good sometime?" Will finishes by smiling the most innocent smile. If it were anybody else but him, I might actually be a little angry, but with Will I have to laugh - and I have to be relieved that he's in a good mood.

"I'll make you a deal - as soon as New Hampshire wins the Frozen Four, you can videotape Jenny and me having sex."

Mario laughs, but Will just sticks his hand out for a shake. "You've got a deal, Debra. And you've made a brand-new New Hampshire fan." I wonder, for a moment, what I've gotten myself into... and then I wonder for a few more moments whether Jenny and I will still be together when next year's Frozen Four arrives, much less whenever my alma mater finally wins one. We've never really talked long-term.

Will sips from his Anchor Steam. "So how did you and Jenny meet, anyway?"

"Oh, it was a blind date. It's all her fault," I say, pointing to Simone, who's a few yards away trying to convince a customer that she doesn't really want to order a tall glass of Goldschläger on the rocks. "We road-tripped up to New Hampshire for a few days in mid-December. I met her family, we hung out at their brewpub in Portsmouth, then she came with me to see UNH play hockey against Maine... we got totally socked in by a snowstorm that weekend, and ended up raiding her Dad's wine cellar. She was bitching about the pressure she was feeling to get a boob job, I was bitching about the online dating thing, and suddenly she said, 'Hey, you and this lawyer I know would totally hit it off.' So she gave Jenny my e-mail and here we are."

"Wait," says Mario, "how did Simone know Jenny in the first place?"

"Oh, I think Simone used to be a Starbucks barista across from the courthouse in Brooklyn Heights, and Jenny used to come in a lot, or something."

"Nice," nods Will. "You really never know how you're going to..." He can't seem to finish the sentence, and looks away as he drinks more of his beer. Mario puts his arm around Will's shoulders. I really don't know what to do except reach for his hand on the bar, and give it a squeeze before I go back to serving drinks. When Michigan finally loses to Notre Dame in overtime, 5-4, Will has long since left for home.

First of all, many thanks to Barmaid Blog reader Stacie for sending me "5 People Who Died During Sex" from my Amazon.com wish list. It's a fun read, and much appreciated!

Barmaid Blog reader Michelle e-mailed me an article from the New Yorker's blog, "The Point of Tipping." Other than not having any idea why they picked that title for the article, I think it's well-taken. Amy, the Bowery Ballroom barmaid profiled in the post, isn't the first person to come away from a service industry experience with tipping stereotypes. In my experience at The Bar, gay men are usually the best tippers, and young, straight, immediately-post-college men are usually the worst. Women who are or have been barmaids or waitresses in the past (and they're usually not shy about telling me) also usually tip well. There's a pretty huge spectrum in the middle, but some patterns emerge, and shift over time.

But one principle holds true no matter who you are: "If you can't afford to tip, don't buy a drink," Amy says. Damn straight.

Michelle also mentioned, in the spirit of the article, a few artists she's been listening to lately - Priscilla Ahn, Sea Wolf, Beirut, Santogold, and A. A. Bondy. Of those I'm only familiar with Beirut, but I'll check out the others. My favorite recent discovery is Libbie Schrader, whom I saw a few months ago at the Bitter End... check out her incredible song "War on Science," but make sure you find the version from her self-titled album, not the one from "Letters to Boys." She's also pretty hot, but don't tell her I said so. Thanks for the recommendations, Michelle!

Barmaid Blog reader Dennis, who talked a little trash about UNH vs. Miami (OH) hockey last year, sent me another note in between New Hampshire's awful, inexplicable loss to Notre Dame (who even knew they had a hockey team?!) in the first round on Friday and Miami's first-round game against Air Force on Saturday:

I have been writing this email in my head for about a week now and since I have finally sat down to write it I am afraid that I am a bit too late. I was hoping that I could goad you into a bet should my Miami Redhawks play your UNH Wildcats.. but as I am sure you know by now that won't be happening. We are in the second year of a new building and have spent the entire year within the top five in the country, really only playing poorly in two home losses to the Great Satan of College Sports, Michigan.

I hope Michigan loses and hopefully that will pave the way for us... Also if you look at the bracket assuming we win in the first round I am hoping to play Minnesota in the second round cause I think it's unfair to play BC in Wooster, MA. Neutral site my ass.

We went over the "neutral site" thing last year, so I won't address it again... I haven't heard from Dennis since the games played out, but I have to imagine he had quite the heart attack when theoretical patsy Air Force took Miami to overtime before finally losing. I also imagine he wasn't too thrilled when Miami coughed up their 2-0 lead over Boston College, allowing three goals in less than two minutes... and eventually losing to BC 4-3 in overtime, the third year in a row that Miami's elimination from the NCAA tournament came at BC's hands.

You know you have my sympathies, Dennis, and not just because both of our teams are now playing golf - but because overall #1 seed Michigan is now in the Frozen Four and seeking their 937th national championship. *sigh* Maybe next year one of our alma maters (almas mater? almae matres?) will finally have their turn in the spotlight.

Lastly, Barmaid Blog reader Derek e-mailed to alert me to his own new site, "Tip the Hottie." It's a clever idea - barmaids post their photos, web surfers "tip" them based on how hot they think the barmaids are, and the winning barmaid each month gets $200. It's free for a barmaid to post a profile, and it's free to "tip," but the prizes are real money, so I gather that it's advertising-driven. There aren't all that many women on it yet, though - only one in all of New York state (and none in the city)! For the amount of effort it takes to post a photo, the possibility of $200 at the end of the month seems like a pretty good payoff, so I encourage my fellow barmaids to join up, and all my readers to show them some love with virtual tips.

It's a laundry day, people... time to add the fabric softener.

Mario leafs wordlessly through several pages of the magazine, then hands it back to Jocelyn and looks down at his beer.

"What do you think?" asks Simone.

"I'll tell you when I figure out how to look at you again, okay?"

Jocelyn laughs. "I think that means your photos turned him on." It's been several months since Simone did her first shoot with John, a porn photographer who left his card here, and some of the photos finally ended up in a magazine. Jocelyn and I are working the relatively docile Wednesday shift; Simone just came in to show us the mag, hot off the presses.

"Debra?" Simone holds it out to me. I've been avoiding this since I knew the photos existed, but now I feel like I'm being a bad friend, so I shrug and I take it. The title makes me want to roll my eyes; then I flip to the page marked with a Post-It, and the first thing I see...

"Holy shit, Simone," I say. "They couldn't ease me into it a little more than that?" She smiles, and shrugs. I flip through her layout, and wince a little at the story accompanying the photos. But I have to admit two things - she looks great, at least in the shots where they're not too close for my comfort; and this guy knows what the hell he's doing. "You did a fantastic job, honey. You look just great."

"Thank you, Debra! That means a lot to me."

Jocelyn grabs it again to take another look. "Are you going to do more?" I grin as Mario gets up from the bar and goes over to the jukebox to stare at the selection, something I'm pretty sure I've never seen him do before.

"Well, I'd like to! John said he's already gotten some calls asking for me specifically, but he said a few of them were... well, conditional."

"On what?" asks Vince, cleaning the taps. "You already told him you wouldn't have sex on camera."

"No, nothing like that - and that's still true. No, he said he thought he could sell a lot more layouts if I had my boobs done. They want my face and most of my body, but her tits," she says, gesturing at Jocelyn.

"Oh, no, don't do that!" Jocelyn shakes her head. "You have no idea how lucky you are not to have these! Please tell me you won't make yours bigger just to make some money?" I decide to stay out of this one, given that I happen to think there's only one good reason that Jocelyn's tips are usually better than mine.

"I don't think I'm going to, but I haven't decided for sure."

A debate on the issue continues for a while, and I try to stick to serving drinks, though at one point I'm a little surprised to overhear Mario talking about how difficult it sometimes is for him and Jocelyn to find a comfortable position. I mostly take orders down at the other end of the bar.

"Could I have a dry martini, please?"

He's easily six feet tall, but his face makes him look about sixteen years old. Bill's not working the door tonight, so I ask him for some ID. As he pulls out his wallet, I notice he's wearing latex gloves on his hands. He hands me his license, and I check it over. Twenty-four, and it looks legit, so I hand it back and mix his drink. He leaves enough cash on the bar to cover the drink and a decent tip, and wanders off to join a friend on the other side of the room, holding his glass with a gloved hand. I wonder what his story is, but it's not really the kind of thing you can ask about politely, so I just go on with my night.

Simone taps me on the shoulder. "Hey, before I leave, Debra, are you still thinking about going up to New Hampshire for a weekend?"

"Yeah, but I haven't really decided when. Why?"

"Well, I was hoping to get back to Portsmouth sometime to see some friends from high school, I thought maybe we could roadtrip together - maybe rent a car, share the driving, make it more economical?"

"Sounds good to me."

"Okay, I'll call you and we'll figure out when, okay?" She waves, and leaves The Bar.

Not a minute later, she comes back in, and marches right over to me. "Hey, uh, you know I'm not making a pass at you, right? I'm not into that, I just, I mean, I know I've said I think you've got a great body, that was professional, John wanted you to -- well, I'm saying it was an objective -- not objectifying, that's not what I meant to -- look, I know what you're into, but just because I take off my clothes..."

I can't help laughing out loud at this point. "What?!" she says.

I clear my throat and do my best to get rid of the smile. "Thanks for letting me down easy." She blushes, and I laugh again.

I hate it when the World Series only goes four games.

No matter who plays in the Series, business is always great and the tips flow freely - and as with most of the other big tip nights, the most senior barmaids get first crack at working those nights. And I'm the most senior; I have been for nearly a year. The difference here is that if I sign up to work Superbowl Sunday, at least I know the Superbowl will actually happen.

So here I am working on Monday night, my sixth night on in a row, which I hate to do unless there's a really good reason, and the Dr. Suess Series ("Rox vs. Sox") is already over. The Red Sox have won their second Series (and second Series sweep) in four years, and there's talk about how the "Nation" is already getting as obnoxious and entitled as we Yankees fans supposedly are (or have been, or were), but whatever they're doing tonight, they're not doing it here. Monday Night Football is always good for a decent crowd, but for whatever reason Green Bay and Denver isn't a marquis matchup for customers of The Bar, so it's not a good crowd. Maya and I are doing a lot of hurry up and wait.

The one real saving grace is a group of five women in business suits drinking at my end of the bar. They've clearly had some success in whatever their field is, because they're treating themselves to a significant amount of top shelf liquor - premium vodka martinis, single malt Scotches, even an Opus One wine, something we don't advertise we carry unless someone asks for something of its caliber - and round after round of it. Unlike a lot of the women who drink here, they're holding it pretty well and not making asses of themselves. Best of all, even though one of them gave me a credit card to hold onto and run a tab for them, there's been a steadily growing pile of cash in front of their spot on the bar with my proverbial name on it. Unless my experienced barmaid's eyes are mistaken, they're tipping me two or three dollars a drink, which might just make my sixth night on in a row worth getting through.

I love it when customers know how to make me happy - it makes me want to make them happy, and then everybody has a good night.

"How long have you been doing this?" asks one of them as I'm serving another round. They're all probably in their thirties, and this one is the tallest and by all indications the leader of the group, if not in the office, then certainly in The Bar.

"A little more than four years," I reply, and clear away the last of the previous round's empties.

"I don't know how your feet can take it," she says. "I lasted less than a year."

"Oh, where did you tend bar?" I guess that helps explain the generous, and cash, tips.

"A little dive near the University of Arizona, where I was going to school."

"Hey, I'm a Wildcat, too! Just the University of New Hampshire variety."

"That's funny! I've never been up there, but I hear it's pretty."

"Likewise with me and Tucson."

"Yeah, I miss it all the time - I'd go back to visit, but I don't really know anybody there anymore. And my firm doesn't recruit from their law school, so I can't sign up for a free business trip."

There's a pause, and my experienced barmaid's sense of timing leads me to say, "Well, just let me know if you ladies need anything else." I go to enter their drinks on the register, and out of the corner of my eye I see a few more bills land on the pile of cash.

I've been talking a good game these last several months about making it back to New Hampshire for a visit, but with Jessica's wedding, my other trip to California, my problems with Gary and our eventual break-up, and working long hours here, I haven't gotten around to it. And now it's hockey season again, and UNH's men's team is 3-0-0 and ranked #4 in the country.

Well, right now I'm free of obligations to anybody but myself. I haven't been at UNH or seen a UNH hockey game since 2002, and it's time to do something about that. I resolve to look up their schedule when I get home, pick a weekend, and just go.

It's well past midnight when the Wildcat and her crew pack it in for the night, vowing to return some other time. I wait an appropriate interval after they're out the door before scooping up what they've left me, and giving it a quick glance with my experienced barmaid's counting eye.

It's close to two hundred dollars.

They just paid for my weekend in New Hampshire, it occurs to me. I start to think about ice and sharp skate blades, about hot chocolate and tattoo parlors, about local hockey fans and the smell of wood burning in a fireplace. And I smile.

...and die it was.

I went to Another Bar™ in Manhattan to watch the New Hampshire vs. Miami (Ohio) hockey game among about a dozen other Wildcats fans earlier this afternoon, only to be shocked into stunned silence along with the rest of them. With less than five minutes left, Wildcat Mike Radja scored the most beautiful short-handed goal I've ever seen - while basically horizontal, even - but it wasn't enough, because Miami was already up 2-0 by that time. My boys never had another good chance, even after pulling the goalie and skating 6-on-4 for the last minute or so. It was Miami's first NCAA hockey tournament win ever in five tries, and it had to come against New Hampshire. :-(

Well, congratulations to your Redhawks, Dennis, and I hope they kick some St. Lawrence or Boston College ass tomorrow. Damn. It always hurts for a little while after the last loss of the season, especially when that first national championship has been so elusive... and I was really looking forward to a crazy, last-minute trip to Manchester tomorrow and a visit back to campus in Durham. UNH really doesn't do reunions until you've been out for twenty or thirty years, but maybe I'll try to get back there sometime this summer anyway - as much as I love the city, I miss New England.

Barmaid Blog reader Dennis, who helped out our perspective on Wingwomen several months back, sent me a fantastic e-mail last night, which among other things said:

...the point of this email is far more serious than you and I catching up as it were. I have been reading your blog for going on a year I think and when I first started reading and realized that you were a UNH alum I always knew this day between us would come.... Next Saturday your beloved Wildcats are playing my beloved Miami Redhawks in a first round NCAA [Hockey] Tournament game..I am a Miami Alum and grew up in Oxford where Miami is and went there and continue to live here since it's such a great place. (Many years ago your assistant coach Dave Lassonde was an assistant here). It doesn't seem fair that we have to pay UNH in Manchester... last year we ended up playing either BU or BC at the Fleet Center in Boston.. How the hell can the NCAA call those neutral site games?

Honestly, Dennis, I'll take whatever advantage the NCAA gives us - I don't pretend to completely understand the methodology behind the NCAA hockey tournament brackets, but it's the same methodology that gave first Minnesota and then Wisconsin home ice advantage in the regionals the last two years, so it's about time we get a turn.

The real injustice, as far as I'm concerned, is that they play these games on weekends, when thousands of honest bartenders are working their hardest! Sure, the Miami vs. UNH game is at one in the afternoon, so I should be able to watch it before I go to work Saturday night - and the regional final, when hopefully UNH will face the winner of St. Lawrence vs. Boston College (no offense, Dennis), will also be on TV Sunday afternoon at 3:30. But I want to be there!! I haven't been to a UNH game since we beat Cornell in the regional final in 2002 in Worcester.

I just checked the Greyhound schedule - I could get out of work at around four in the morning on Sunday, hop on a seven o'clock bus at Port Authority, and (after two transfers) be in Manchester by 2:40, plenty of time to make the final.

I'm positive I'd run into people I know - and even if I didn't, I could hitch a ride back to Durham afterwards and crash at my old sorority house.

(Dare I even dream about the Frozen Four in St. Louis, two weeks later?)

I have to say, it's making me smile to think about doing something this crazy. So good luck, Dennis (and the tens of thousands of other Miami (OH) fans who may be reading this right now), but I really think this is our year - and I really think I'm going to be in Manchester to see New Hampshire in the final. After several dozen cups of coffee.

It's Thursday afternoon. I walk out of the back room trying to process everything that's been said, and I stick my notebook back in my bag. Later in the afternoon I'll send an e-mail to my lawyer describing everything I talked about with Lanie and Victor and asking whether she thinks what they've proposed is fair, but I already have a pretty good sense that I'm happy with the outcome - with everything but what started this standoff in the first place.

Leonard, the guy with the hands, has nothing to do with the Bar or its ownership. Lanie and Victor told me that part of their tentative agreement with Todd is that they aren't free to discuss with me what Todd's connection to Leonard is or might be, but in any event Leonard is persona non grata at the Bar as I asked. And frankly I don't think I've ever much cared what Todd's motivation was - I don't know of anything that would justify him hanging me out to dry the way he did.

Todd's and Pat's management responsibilities will more or less be swapped. Todd will manage Sundays through Tuesdays, and Pat Wednesdays through Saturdays - and for the time being, I will work only on Pat's nights, which isn't much of a change for me, it just means I won't do any subbing early in the week. Todd has already written me an apology, which I read while still sitting in the meeting with Lanie and Victor. Whether it was heartfelt or sincere I have no idea, but it was pretty close to what I'd been looking for.

As for the other consequences to Todd - and there are other consequences - I have been asked not to talk about them with anybody, even other staff at the Bar, because there are privacy issues. And so I won't, other than to say two things: I'm satisfied - and there are some things he has to do before we're ever again scheduled to work a shift together.

I came in for our meeting at about three in the afternoon, and when I leave the back room, Maya is showing the new barmaid how to open the Bar, while Pat does some paperwork. Pat hops off her stool and meets me at the end of the bar with a smile and an extended hand. "Hey, stranger - it's nice to see you around here again."

I shake her hand. "I'm not sure how nice it is just yet, but it's a start."

"Well, it'll be fun working with you more often again. Come on, let me introduce you to Simone. Simone!"

Simone turns around from where she and Maya have been cutting lemons and limes, and smiles brightly. Blonde, skinny, looks a little bit like Uma Thurman, or maybe Farrah Fawcett in her younger, twig-like days. What Carrie Fisher once called "your basic nightmare." And I remember that I don't know anything about her and should be giving her the benefit of the doubt, just like I hope everyone else will give me the same. I smile and extend my hand.

"I'm Debra. Welcome to the Bar, I hope we'll get a chance to work together."

"Thanks! I'm Simone. Hey," she says, pointing at my Wildcats sweatshirt, "did you go to New Hampshire?"

"Yeah, I did."

"I grew up in Portsmouth, just down the road."

"Really? We used to go out to Portsmouth in the spring when the weather started getting nice again... there was this great Mexican restaurant with a deck right on the water. What the hell was it called... Paco's?"

"Paco's... Oh, Poco's Bow Street Cantina?"

"Yes! Poco's, not Paco's. Oh, my God, they made great margaritas. It's been a few years, and I still miss that drink... it's the closest I've ever felt to being high without, you know... actually being high." She nods and laughs.

"Hey, Little Miss Victim," says Maya, not even looking up from her limes.

"Maya, cut the shit," Pat snaps. I quickly say my goodbyes and head out.

When I get home, after I e-mail my lawyer, I start looking at the jobs section on Craigslist.

After reading about Samantha and Will's bet the other day, Barmaid Blog reader Kate wrote:

Your anecdote about Michigan-OSU rivalry and the, uh, ramifications of sleeping with the enemy really hit home for me. If you'll allow me, I'd like to share a little story of my own. Forgive the length.

The setting is Buffalo, New York, and the time is mid-April 2003. My two friends and I ditched our Thursday and Friday classes to go cheer on our friends on the Cornell hockey team as they battled UNH in the Frozen Four. Let me tell you, we HATED the UNH fans. Now, I am sure you female Wildcats are perfectly lovely, but I have a serious problem with the male UNHers. They heckled us as soon as we stepped in the arena, past their bars, etc. -- we were "stuck up Ivy bitches" -- and that's the very least of it. We are, for the record, anything but. But I digress.

We both know how that semi-final went down. The number four team in the country managed to knock off the number one team due to a bullshit waved-off goal and breaks that just didn't fall the Big Red's way.

Fast forward to that night. We hang out with the Cornell boys. They're heartbroken. We don't talk about the game much. We drink many beers and do many shots. I amaze a couple of the Canadians by telling them, in French, that I can understand what they're saying and not to try anything funny. We all end up traipsing back to the Adam's Mark, where the boys and us girls are staying.

A few hours later, I'm a little bit more sober and "Emily" is crying. She can't find her cell phone. Inconsolable, she goes outside "for a ciggy" and I fall back asleep.

Dawn breaks. I wake up to Emily swooping grandly back into our room. She grasps the bathroom's doorframe and swings around a la Gene Kelly in "Singin' in the Rain."

"What," I say, "is your problem?"

"Lanny Gare!" She sings.

Our third friend "Keira" looks up from her textbook. Apparently she's an early riser and decided to study while I was still sleeping. (This did not, however, have any discernible impact on her abysmal grades.) "What?!" she practically screeches.

"I fucked Lanny Gare!" Emily bounces down onto the bed and proceeds to tell us that she ran into UNH's former all-star player while she was outside smoking and crying. Since he was injured and wouldn't be playing the rest of the weekend, he went out that Thursday night. On his way back in, he saw that Emily was upset and offered to comfort her. Apparently he comforted her for quite some time, after which he pointedly took a shower, cueing her to leave.

Yeah, she slept with the enemy. Keira and I were mighty pissed. I mean, I'm a hearty proponent of embracing your sexuality, being a badass, getting it good early and often, etc. but this was like a war crime or something. Lanny Gare? Not just some random sketchball from UNH, but THE guy we worried about before he was neutered by a bum (shoulder? elbow?). Despicable.

Of course, Keira, being the rather toxic person she is, didn't stop at being outraged privately. She volunteered to go find Emily's phone and in the process of knocking on the players' doors to retrieve the cell, managed to tell all of them just who Emily had entertained earlier that morning. They were justifiably stunned, crushed, mad, outraged and hurt. Emily had betrayed them by compromising her loyalties.

It was a really big deal for a while. Emily got dirty looks from the guys (and her sorority sisters who found out about the debacle) in the dining hall. Even the freshmen on the team were short with her at after hours. I gave her "how could you?" a couple of times but eventually dropped it -- she's just so gosh darn sweet and cute that I can't help but forgive.

Forget, though? Never. Never.

Thanks, Kate! I knew Lanny Gare at UNH, though not very well. And I remember watching the quarterfinals against Boston University on TV from here in New York City, and watching Lanny go down hard less than a minute into the game. He'd carried our team all year, and what were we going to do without him?

We were going to barely beat Cornell, then get absolutely spanked by Minnesota in the title game, as it turned out.

It has occurred to me, by the way, that if the same sort of thing had happened in reverse - a UNH fan sleeping with a Cornell player after the game - you could even look at it as an olive branch, a peace overture of sorts, a bit like saying "You're still okay." But the way it did happen, you and the guys on the Cornell team saw it as an abandonment in their worst time of need. And I guess if I imagine what I would have felt like if one of my friends from UNH had gone and slept with a Minnesota player after we'd lost the title game, I can understand how you felt.

Of course, since I know you're not the only Cornell hockey fan reading this, I would be remiss if I didn't point out that we've been to the national title game twice in the last eight years, and Cornell hasn't.

Wednesday evening, in between bites of chicken, Warren asks, as casually as can be, "I've got my kids this weekend. Do you want to meet them?" My head promptly explodes, leaving blood, brain matter, and bone fragments all over Warren's dining area, and ruining the rest of his chicken.

"I'm working Friday and Saturday nights," I reply, playing with my broccoli rabe.

"I know, I just thought maybe during the afternoon Saturday or something. It doesn't have to be anything big, just come meet us in the park for a walk."

"Can I see how I feel after Friday night's shift?" I'm already pondering a visit to WebMD.com to see if there's any such thing as a crippling six-hour flu.

"Of course! I think they'd really like you." I smile, because the flattery is meant well.

The sex that night is really good, if maybe a little slower and more tender than it's been our first several times, less fierce and hungry. Variety is good, I think to myself as I sit in his living room watching television for a few hours after he falls asleep, victim again of our divergent schedules. I'd work on my novel, but Warren told me to leave my laptop at home.

My grandfather on my mother's side died when I was about eight, and my grandmother less than two years later. I don't recall anything specific being wrong with her, just that her health started failing after Grandpa died. I remember more than one relative telling me at the time that Grandma died of a broken heart, that sometimes two people are so much in love with each other that after one of them dies there's simply no reason for the other to go on.

As a ten year old, I thought that was a beautiful, romantic concept. Sometime after I turned eleven, it hit me how unfair it was that I could end up dying early just because my stupid husband had eaten a bad clam and gone first. And when I was thirteen, and my mother left, I worried that my father would literally drop dead from grief. It was only when he didn't that it finally dawned on me what a pile of crap I'd been handed a few years earlier.

Despite that, though, and despite how my parents' marriage ended, I think I remain a romantic. I cry at romantic movies, and I still believe that there's someone out there for me to share my life with. I just don't know if I have what it takes to be a good mother. As I've said here before, I don't even know if I want to try, given how disastrously my own mother failed. I love kids, and I know people who are going to make outstanding parents someday, I just have strong doubts about whether I'm one of them.

Thursday morning after Warren has gone off to work, telling me I should sleep in if I want to, I lay awake staring at the photo of his kids on his nightstand.

Late morning I'm sitting at home eating a Sausage McMuffin and reading e-mail, when in pops one from Jessica. It's information about flights, hotels, transportation, and various events for her wedding weekend in San Francisco in May. I've clearly received the "wedding party" version of the e-mail, as it includes things like final fittings, hair and nail appointments, the bachelorette party, and a rehearsal dinner. I imagine myself in the amazing dress Jessica picked out for her bridesmaids, I imagine Warren in his tux, I imagine the assembled crowd watching us dance gracefully to the wonderful music, and then I imagine Warren's two children tugging at his pant legs in the middle of our dance, wanting to go potty.

I shove the remaining quarter McMuffin into my mouth like the delicate lady that I am, and look for my phone.

"Hello?"

"I'm not ready."

"Debra?"

"Yeah. I'm not ready."

"For what?"

"To meet your kids. I'm not ready to meet your kids."

There's a pause. "Okay, you're not ready. There's no rush."

"Good, yeah, because the thing is I'm not ready."

There's a longer pause. "Are you okay?"

"What? I'm fine. I'm going to go take a nap. Have a good day, okay?"

"All right, you too. And have a good shift tonight."

I hang up, finish my orange juice, and scan my bookshelves. The photo album is at the bottom. I start at the end, and flip backward through the pages slowly. A bunch from the Bar, including Jessica and me in our evening gowns for New Years Eve. A few of me with guys I've dated over the last few years, or out with groups of friends. Peter and me while we were dating. A bunch of New York City when I'd first moved here. Before that, college - Dad and me at graduation, my sorority sisters, assorted boyfriends, UNH and Durham in the snow, a few of the hockey team beating Cornell in the national quarterfinals. High school graduation, again with Dad. Me at the prom. Me on the high school tennis team. And then finally I get back far enough.

Dad, Mom, and me. I think it must have been visiting day at the day camp where I taught tennis the summer before I started high school. Between being bat mitzvahed that spring and being in charge of a bunch of little girls, I felt so grown up, and I thought my parents were so proud of me. It was a beautiful day, and the photo's a really good one, if you don't look too closely, or if you don't know what was about to happen. I'm in the middle, beaming for the camera and holding my tennis racquet. My father is on my right, with his left hand on my left shoulder. My mother is on my left, using her right hand to shield her eyes from the sun. My father is smiling, but he isn't looking at the camera, he's looking at my mother. And my mother is looking away, and not really smiling much at all.

I pull the photo out of the album, and look closely at my father. I ask him in my head what I've never asked him out loud: Would you have married her if you'd known?

Well, I still have my job, which is quite a relief.

Monday I arrive at the Bar about twenty minutes early for my 8-to-close shift, figuring Todd will probably want to talk to me about Saturday night, and of course he does. He gives me a firm talking to in the back room about my responsibility to the Bar, to the customers, to my fellow staff members, and to myself, and I deserve every word of it. I apologize for letting him down. Then he says something that surprises me.

"Debra, I've always thought you would be a great bar manager. I know you enjoy what you're doing, and you'd have to give up some of your tip income, but you're smart and responsible, and the people who work with you look up to you. Well, you're usually responsible." He smiles. "I don't have the power to make you a manager myself, but there's no question that if the day manager position ever opened up, Lanie and Victor [the owners] would ask me if there was anybody already working here who I thought was ready for it. I want you to think about that."

"Wow," is all I can really think to say. "Todd, that means a lot to me. And I'll try not to let you down again."

So I'm on with Amy, who tells me she heard a few things about what happened Saturday, but wants to hear the whole story. I tell her, and the more I think about it, the more I realize that I was probably unfair to Randi, the woman who came in with Peter. I mean, she's obviously dating him, but as Cynthia Heimel once said, "Never judge someone by who he's in love with; judge him by his friends. People fall in love with the most appalling people." Plus, Randi was obviously upset by some of his behavior, too, so she can't be all bad. And, quite honestly, I thought the chain she was wearing in her navel was awesome, and now I'm thinking about getting mine pierced. I wonder, would my tips from straightlaced Manhattan business suit types when I'm wearing a midriff shirt get better or worse because of a pierced navel?

Also on Monday I finally learn that my New Hampshire Wildcats men's hockey team not only tied Boston University this weekend, but also beat #1 ranked and previously undefeated Maine, our greatest rivals. Wait, "beat" is the wrong word for an 8-2 final - we killed them. Ah, how satisfying... maybe this will finally be the year we get that national championship we've been denied for so long.

This morning I finally get around to a short film I've been meaning to watch. Barmaid Blog reader Jonathan e-mailed me a while ago to tell me he'd entered a short film in the "Contagious Festival" on the Huffington Post. I thought it was very funny! It's a parody on the gay marriage controversy that's been brewing here in the United States, called "Some of My Best Friends Are American" - about a supposed initiative in New Zealand to make it illegal for Americans to marry other Americans. I think the more people watch the movie, the better chance they have of doing well in the festival, though I'm not sure how that works... but in any event, I thoroughly enjoyed it, and recommend it without reservation. If you enjoy it, you should pass it on, too. Best of luck, Jonathan!

Oh, and it should have occurred to me that readers would think my ridiculously hot IM conversation late Saturday night was with Jessica. I guess I could have been clearer about that. Jessica and I have always talked very frankly about sex, including the times we've talked since we cleared the air a few weeks ago. But we've never "cybered," as the kids call it these days. My "cyber" partner was a girl I've never met, with whom I've been IMing with for a while, a college student named Nancy. We just happened both to be drunk enough in the wee hours on Saturday night to take it somewhere I guess neither of us was quite expecting.

Over lunch earlier today, I tell Warren about what "happened" online with Nancy, just so he doesn't hear it from someone else. We've never talked about being exclusive, and I don't think I've "cheated" on him, but it's important to me to be open with him. He nods and eats quietly while I tell him, then clears his throat.

"Well, I have to admit, this is a new one for me," he says. "Maybe I'm showing my age, but that kind of interaction has never appealed to me as an alternative to the real thing."

I smile. "Even when the real thing isn't available?"

He nods some more. "She knows about me?"

"Yup."

"Okay, now I know about her. Where does that leave us?"

"Still on for tomorrow night, I hope."

"You'd better believe it," he says. "Under one condition."

"What's that?"

"You don't bring your laptop."

I act shocked. "What? No laptop? How are we supposed to have a threesome with her?" He laughs and shakes his head.

(Hey, has anybody who's bought something from the Barmaid Blog Store received their orders yet? How did they come out? Have you been wearing them around? Looking sexy? Getting compliments?)

So, more on this past weekend. Saturday night is pretty uneventful at the Bar - game one of the World Series is on, but very few of the regulars care, because neither the Yankees nor the Mets are involved. We do get a decent turnout of Detroit Tigers fans, though, which makes some of the Yankee fan regulars a little uncomfortable because the Tigers eliminated the Yanks. The way I see it, though, if Detroit wins the Series it means there's less shame in the Yanks having lost to them on the way there. Besides, people tip better when their team is doing well, and we need all the help we can get - for the most part, for some reason, baseball fans rooting for any team other than a New York team don't tip very well at the Bar. And Cardinals fans might be watching the game somewhere, but it ain't here.

But it doesn't go our way Saturday night - despite being heavily favored, Detroit loses game one to the St. Louis Cardinals, 7-2. St. Louis leads from the third inning on, and tips from the Detroit crowd get worse and worse. Maya starts adopting a very interesting strategy - shaking her head slightly and "tsk"ing quietly when someone tips poorly, as if she just can't believe it. I don't think it's very effective, and it might even make things worse. But that's her problem; we're not one of those bars where the whole staff pools tips and splits them evenly at the end of the night. Todd feels very strongly that working for our own tips encourages us to put forth our best efforts, and I tend to think he's right, at least in general.

There are some kinks in that theory - for instance, Jocelyn's tips are almost always better than mine, but that's because men lose all control of their faculties (and their wallets) around enormous breasts. But for the most part, I like that if I take home $300 in tips at the end of the night, it's because I worked for $300 in tips, not because I worked for $400 and the two other girls tending bar that night each cleared $250. I don't even think I'd like working at a pooled tips bar if I were the one clearing $250 but taking home $300.

Anyway, Saturday night just isn't a great evening for me financially, but when I get home I sleep really well for the first time in over a week. I think that's partly because I finally cleared the air somewhat with Dara and Jessica earlier in the day, but I'm also just dead tired and I want to be well-rested for Sunday.

Sunday evening, Warren is coming over for movies and take-out. I insisted on something low-key and casual because I just want to try to get comfortable with him, and that's been difficult. I've seen him in four different business suits, now - two at the Bar, one at his place, and one when we met for lunch near where he works. Don't get me wrong, he looks great in a suit, and I love dressing up - but I think I get to know people more easily when it's informal. He's bringing the movies, and I'm picking the take-out; he said I could order anything, there's absolutely nothing he won't eat. That's a serious temptation for mischief, but I decide to resist and stick with something at least relatively mainstream.

So I'm by myself for the whole afternoon, because Cassie and Jill are elsewhere for the evening by design, and both independently decided to be elsewhere for most of the weekend. We didn't even do our bagels and pajamas brunch today. Not the first time, and not a big deal - we miss a Sunday here and there, and the sky hasn't fallen yet. We'll probably just make a point of doing it next week. I still spend most of the afternoon in my PJs, though, and instant messaging with the TV on. It's a good, quiet afternoon of gossip and anticipation, but finally it's time to shower and get dressed.

Warren arrives at 7 on the dot, and he's wearing jeans and a navy blue NYPD sweatshirt - which is kind of funny, because I'm wearing jeans and a navy blue UNH Wildcats Hockey sweatshirt, so we match, which is absolutely dorky. He has a six-pack of Sam Adams with him, and DVDs of "Breaker Morant" and "10 Things I Hate About You," neither of which I've ever seen. The Thai food I ordered a few minutes before he got here arrives at 7:15, and we huddle together under a blanket on the Comfy Couch watching "Breaker Morant" and trying not to get pad thai and curry puffs all over ourselves.

It's an amazing, powerful film - it came out the year before I was born, but other than that I have to wonder why I've never heard of it before. It's the true story of two Australian soldiers serving in the Boer War (which I'd also never heard of) in South Africa just after the turn of the 20th century, who are court martialed for basically doing their jobs. Lieutenant Harry "Breaker" Morant (played by Edward Woodward) was also a poet, and the story is made all the more poignant by Woodward's voice-over of some of the godawful poetry Morant wrote while in prison and on trial. Maybe it's just because I also read "To Kill a Mockingbird" earlier in the weekend, but it's an awful lot of injustice for one girl to absorb in the space of a couple of days, and I'm in tears by the end. Warren lifts up my chin, looks in my eyes, and wipes away a tear with his thumb - and then I kiss him.

This isn't how I envisioned it happening... I was going to bring out some ice cream for dessert during the second movie, and then figure out some really smooth way to move in on Warren if he hadn't already moved in on me. It was going to be very cool and seductive, and it would have made a great story. Instead, I'm climbing on him, dripping tears on him, and struggling to get one of my arms unstuck from underneath the blanket. It is, I think, one of the unsexiest moments of my life. Nevertheless, we never do watch the second movie.

I won't go into too much detail - but my first time with a man in more months than I'd care to count turns out to be great. As does the second...! And then he spends the night.

One of the occupational hazards of being a barmaid, unfortunately, is that I'm up until 4 or 5am several nights a week, and it's useless to try to switch to a more "normal" schedule on the other days. That's got its benefits, of course - I never have to fight Cassie or Jill for the shower when I get up on weekdays, since they're already at work. But the downside is spending the night with someone who's on a very, very different schedule. Warren gets up at 6am most mornings, and in fact I've set my alarm for 6 before we actually got in bed - but now that we're here, and it's barely midnight, I'm wide awake (if physically worn out), and he's rapidly drifting off.

Eventually, he's snoring to wake the dead, and I just have to get out of bed and leave the room so I can laugh about it without waking him up. When I come back, I log back on and start IMing again - as long as I'm awake anyway, the gossip is just too good to let it wait until morning, so I chat with a friend on the west coast and have another beer. I even tell her I'm considering staying up even later so I can wake Warren at 5am for a third go-'round, just so I don't have to suffer the pain of a 6am alarm when I've only slept for a couple of hours.

Finally, it's getting close to 3am, and I think I might be able to sleep, so I say my goodnight and log off. But instead of climbing back into bed with Warren right away, I turn around in my chair, put my feet up on the bed, and for a little while, I just watch him sleep.

Only one UNH hockey player got drafted in the NHL draft yesterday - Peter LeBlanc. He's an incoming freshman forward, drafted in the seventh round.

Don't go to Chicago yet, Peter! We're so close to a national title, I just know it!

Meanwhile, my roommates didn't even know there was such a thing as "college hockey."

Women!! ;-)

I have the 8-to-close tonight. A rainy summer Sunday in a Manhattan bar? The black hole of tipping. Wish me luck...