Bracken & Bell

Today was supposed to be about comparing e-readers to paper books, but that’s been moved to next week. I’ve been distracted for the last thirty-one hours or so, and haven’t been able to clear my head enough to write about anything else.

I went out yesterday with my partner to run an errand that took us to the other side of the city. There’s a restaurant we like over there, so lunch seemed like a good idea.

We were given a nice booth in a quiet corner, and a booth near us had a man and three small children. Our favourite server, Maggie, came to say hello and then left to get us drinks.

Shortly after she left, the man at the other booth called out to get our attention. I looked (already was facing him), then he said he loved our glasses. Now, my partner and I look like the grooviest of folks and regularly get comments about our glasses, so that’s par for the course. I smiled and thanked him, then turned to continue speaking with my partner.

The man called out again. Again I looked, and this time he asked if we smoke. That’s also a fairly common question I get, so I just chuckled and said no. He loudly clarified “I mean weed” and mimed smoking. At that point, it seemed to me like his tone changed from sounding friendly to sounding a bit desperate. I thought maybe he was asking if I had any cannabis, and suddenly I felt very uncomfortable. I said, “I’m sorry, I don’t have any on me.” and turned back to speak with my partner.

Why was this guy doing this in a restaurant? With strangers? In front of his kids? Loudly?

The man then pulled out a bag from next to him. While opening it, he explained at full volume that he has quit smoking weed and found something “so much better” that it is “very cheap”, and he wanted to know if we were interested. He actually opened his bag and held it in a way as to show me what was in it, but I guess I wasn’t paying attention. I do remember him doing it, but mostly I just remember my stomach dropping and a tight feeling in my chest.

I said, “No, thanks” and then went back to looking at my partner. My partner hadn’t said anything the entire time, and he couldn’t see what was going on, but he looked tense and concerned. The man at the other table put his bag away, then attended to his children without saying anything further that I could hear.

That’s a super weird thing to happen at a restaurant in the middle of the day, right? I started wondering if I was losing it, so I asked my partner as quietly as I could “Did that guy just offer to sell us drugs?” and my partner said “Yep, he sure did.”

Maggie came back a couple of minutes later with our drinks, and I asked to speak with her privately. We walked closer to the restaurant kitchen, and I quietly told her what had happened. I was more upset than I’d realized, and I felt a lot of guilt. I told her that I absolutely did not want to cause any trouble, but that I was incredibly uncomfortable sitting where I was just looking at that man, and he could look at me.

I went back and told my partner we were moving tables. Maggie came over and grabbed our drinks, and we followed her. As we were walking away, I heard one of the small children say, “Ohhh Daddy, you’re in trouble!”. The kid didn’t sound worried or upset or angry. More like it was funny, in a sing-song way, but they didn’t laugh. That broke my heart a little bit. How many times has he done this in front of his kids? How many times has he been caught in front of them? What the heck, bro?

The only booth away from the man was smaller, and the light was broken so it was dark. We were fine with that.

After maybe fifteen or twenty minutes, the man left with his kids. I watched him speaking briefly with Maggie near the door, then they were gone.

We ordered and ate some food that was very yummy, and nothing else happened.