OLIVE OIL, Extra Virgin
Published: thewriteplaceatthewritetime.com (not archived)

Goya. The cheapest kind. Not that Nathan was cheap, well, not that he was ungenerous, he just didn’t have a lot of money. Being an artist is like that. Feast and famine. Someone orders an entire set of custom-built furniture for a bedroom, and there’s a sense of success, a need for celebration. So he offered me dinner – at my home of course—and being used to scrimping, he bought two bottles of a Chilean wine that was actually very good. And the Goya.

I couldn’t tell the difference anyway. I mean, does a $50 bottle of olive oil taste $48 better than the Goya? I can’t answer that question, but imagine the answer lies somewhere in the neighborhood of pretentiousness.

Some olive oils are green. I know that. And the Goya is golden. The bottle on the counter is almost full of gold because he only used a little of it to make the sauce for the ravioli – a sauce so delicate it would taste good on ice cream – and a little for the salad. But what difference does color or price or taste make when I look at that bottle?

I met him in November when he was blowing leaves to the curb in the yard next door. That was the famine part. Yard work in the neighborhood when no one was buying pricey handmade furniture.

He was polite when the neighbor introduced us, although I hadn’t really been paying attention because of a bad telephone conversation I’d just had with a credit card company. And a week later, he frightened me when I was walking to the post office and he came up behind me riding his bike and called my name. Not that he was forgettable, but I hadn’t really expected him to remember me.

We became friends. Sort of.

At first, he made the effort. Coming to my door unexpectedly – what if I had company or been in the middle of a salt scrub and mud facial? -- offering brochures and newspaper announcements about art openings, photography shows, little festivals in parking lots with live music. Free events that usually included food and wine. Said he would meet me there.

I’d given that some thought. Was he making sure I didn’t think of myself as his date or was he too shy or too broke to actually invite me to a film retrospective, live jazz in a club, dinner on the patio of Kitchen Fresh Chicken?

I liked to think of myself as old enough to be his French maid, which sounds better than old enough to be his young aunt. I drink less. I have placement in my personality that he is searching for. I know better. But if there is a way to make an ass out of myself, I have no trouble finding it.

I liked his attention when he came to the door and stayed a little while to chat about his work and mine. I was working on my PhD dissertation on sexism in body language. Ha! He kept inviting me to visit him at the little warehouse where he rented space to make furniture, and I made the mistake of going.

He had a series of chairs aligned against the wall. Each a masterpiece of balance and minimalism – just enough wood and metal to give support – the seat of each chair made of strips of ash, mahogany, oak or a solid piece of pine washed in forest green or thin sheets of copper on the seat. Like that.

A viewing of his soul. Breathtaking. I stopped by often after that first time, and in return, he stopped coming to my door, stopped inviting me to functions. But I was always welcome there to watch him work, to be his audience and fan. It reminded me of a musician I had dated as an undergrad.

With one exception. Nathan was insultingly respectful and admiring of me, and heartlessly lacking in desire. Or so it seemed. He never laid a hand on me. Not even to hug me, except that once. Never leaned in to smell my neck. Never accidentally touched my leg when we stood together. Nada. And he isn’t gay. Then he gave me a copper bracelet that he had woven out of wire for my birthday. Does it mean anything?

In self preservation because I felt older, old, I never gave him the look, the turn of the head, the slight touches that a woman gives a man to let him know she wants him. I did none of that. And hoped that there was no yearning in my eyes when I watched him work. Hoped that if there was, my glib conversation distracted him from noticing it.

I committed to focus more on my dissertation. I had to. I was almost forty and it was getting late. But my mind wandered, and I punished it by staying up all hours scrubbing floors and walls. Pouring something of myself into the mop water. Raking out closets. Playing music way too loud.

At night I took God’s multiple-choice quiz. Would you rather:

1. have a deep, profound love for someone who dies suddenly, leaving you bereft for the rest of your life?

2. have a sexless, but pleasant marriage that lasts 30 years and leaves you with a nice retirement income and a condo in Boca?

3. love a younger man who is fabulously virile, terribly attractive to other woman, and who doesn’t bother you with his sexual desire?

Etcetera

I felt ridiculous thinking about my young leaf-blowing neighbor at all. Had my isolationism in favor of doing something with my life turned me into a pervert?

Yes. And I had to fight it.

But I hadn’t counted on him inviting himself to dinner and knowing how to make ravioli – the dough, the filling, the sauce. I hadn’t counted on drinking so much wine that I noticed it was spring and he wasn’t wearing a long-sleeved flannel shirt and a Phillies cap. No. He wore a black tank top that allowed me to see for the first time the muscles in his arms move as he pinched the ravioli with his fingers. As he poured more wine. His bed-head hair was a torment. And that two-day beard. Damn.

Where was the mop water then? Where was the CD of Coldplay? Did he notice I was wearing the bracelet?

Stop that.

Oh, what a relief it was when he finally left after cleaning up all the dishes, because then, because now, I can tell myself I did the right thing. Oh yes. I did the right thing by keeping my mouth shut. Why risk an uncomfortable conversation about my foolish feelings when I can talk about my dissertation and his chairs. And then when he leaves and finally gives me a hug and I can smell his barely-irresistible personal smell tinged with turpentine, hours after his departure, I continue to discipline myself away from taking a risk and losing by staring at a bottle of olive oil.

What next? Sensible shoes?