I can’t stand it when details are left out—or worse—completely ignored. Especially when it comes to such things as movies whose production values are so high otherwise. The Thomas Crown Affair (1999) was on Lifetime on Sunday afternoon; in the scene where Investigator Catherine Banning (Renee Russo) introduces herself to Thomas Crown (Pierce Brosnan), she knowingly orders him a “scotch, neat” at a high-society event. “Scotch, neat?”
Are you kidding me? Anyone who drinks scotch knows that no one—NO ONE—orders their scotch by saying “Scotch, neat.” You order it by brand because everyone has different taste for Scotch. Details! Details!
Speaking of which, The Glenlivet is my favorite. All I can afford, however, is the 12-year old one. How did a Chinese boy grow up to drink scotch?
Sometime around my tenth birthday, my dad—schooled as he was in things European, having been raised in the former French colony of Vietnam and graduating from university and medical school in Spain—gave me a glass of wine and said, “try this.” I tried it, and was amused. Soon thereafter, my parents let me try beer and other alcoholic beverages. When I say “try,” I mean, TRY, not abusively consume or even consume in quantities: just a sip here and there with dinner.
Did this stunt my growth or cause me to become a raging alcoholic—as parent watchdog groups and conservatives around the U.S. would have you believe? Absolutely not. What did it do? When high school came and everyone was trying desperately to get their hands on alcohol (because it was, and probably still is, the cool thing to do at that time in life) and later drank to stupid oblivion mostly because they had no idea what alcohol would feel like or they sought to boast about their drinking abilities, I was off doing something else more satisfying.
A lesson to be learned? Maybe, but I won’t preach, so you make up your own mind.
Anyway, I developed a certain taste for alcohol. When I was at NYU, a met David, whose tastes for all things alcohol (and others) was impressively refined. He introduced me to the world of Scotch, and eventually, as we worked together at Skadden, Arps in the mid-1990s, both of us came to enjoy Glenlivet. This single-malt scotch is refreshingly—can you say that about a scotch?—light, yet tremendously satisfying in taste and texture; so smooth that if held in your mouth to taste longer, it won’t seem to burn. Another favorite is The Balvenie, introduced to us by another colleague at Skadden. That colleague seemed to be on his way to becoming an alcoholic, though.
Hmm. I miss David. A lot.
We met in my senior year at NYU through a mutual female friend, whom he was very close to. After graduating, we hung out a lot, getting along amazingly well, sharing thoughts, ideas, dreams...and having a lot in common. It was one of those friendships which you feel that you could go weeks—months, a year, maybe even longer—without speaking or seeing each other, but when you did come back together, it was as if no time was lost. Well, things don’t always work out that way.
David and I roomed together for a couple of years and went our separate ways in grad school (he went to business school, I went to law school). As he finished b-school earlier and returned to NYC, I was still busy with law school and a part-time job. Later, the 4-to-4.5 hour daily commute of my post-law school publishing job didn’t afford me much time to see a lot of friends, especially him. Still, I felt that the years had built up a friendship which was unbreakable. And in our talks, I felt he thought the same.
Two years ago, I asked him to be my co-best man (along with my brother) at my wedding. Somehow, I always thought that was going to be the case. To my shock, he replied to me in a lengthy email: declining, he explained that since we hardly saw each other, it made no sense that I was asking him. I was crushed. Nothing we had ever discussed nor anything he’d ever said prepared me for this.
Could his wife—who had hired me for 2 different jobs before, including my present one, but who had always disliked the close friendship David and I shared—have something to do with this? I suspect gravely, but am not certain. A funny thing happened a few months ago. While taking lunch at work, I ran into David in the building lobby. He sheepishly greeted me, and both of us stood there for a couple of minutes, not sure what to say. I offered to bring him upstairs to see his wife because he said he’d been waiting a while for her. She came down just moments later—perhaps sparing David and I an awkward elevator ride together—and I went on my way. But in hindsight, I couldn’t help but feel that we stood there in the lobby like two people who were forbidden to see each other but inadvertently came upon each other. Every time we’d hung out, his wife had appeared to keep a weary eye towards me.
It’s been 2 years and I suppose this wound hasn’t healed. I think about the oddity of how this friendship “seemed to end” so abruptly, and I wonder some times.
I wonder, too, how many people read until the end of this—only to come upon this nugget of wistful recollection and reflection. This is why I can never be a true writer: I can never keep my thoughts in line. I started writing this a week ago, and with tropical storm Hanna soaking the NYC area today, what better time than this to bear down and complete my thoughts? Have a great weekend!
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