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2005-02-21 @ 1:32 a.m.
The guy in the corduroy jacket


There he was. Just standing in the deli department of the yuppie grocery store. Tall with dark curly hair and horn rimmed glasses. He was wearing a corduroy jacket over dark green Dockers. He looked Jewish. He looked like a psychologist or someone who might run his own successful Dot.com business. He was getting two party trays. And as soon as I saw him my heart skipped a beat.

And then I thought about how I looked. I had just come from the gym. Usually I change my clothes. I actually always change my clothes. But not today. I still had on my formless black sweat pants and sneakers and this really dumb striped sweater which I literally never wear. I was also tired and hurting. I had gotten a cramp in my right calf muscle when I was on the treadmill and was kind of limping. My hair was a mess too.

But there he was anyways. Talking to the guy in the deli. Him with the two deli trays. He was probably having a party. An engagement party. Or a birthday party for his girlfriend. Or worse yet, a party for his boyfriend. No. He wasn�t gay. He was wearing corduroy. A gay guy would never wear corduroy. I soon made my way up the aisle towards him and slowly walked by, my heart beating everso rapidly as I got closer. I wanted to check out his deli trays. No really. I just wanted to see if we saw eye to eye on the meat eating thing. I would never want to fall in love with a vegan, after all. Because that would never work out. Even one who looked like him.

The person I�m supposed to be walking with on this Sunday evening at the yuppie grocery store. The person with whom I�m supposed to be leaning against making inside jokes about the precious yuppie types who populate the store. The person who is supposed to be putting his hand on the small of my back while I�m cautiously guiding our cart through the organic vegetable department. The person who will always buy me a bouquet of sunflowers rather than roses, because he knows they reflect my personality more.

And then when I was about 4 feet away from him, he turned and looked at me, and suddenly everything went out of focus momentarily and I didn�t know what to do. It was just him and I, and I saw our whole life together flash before me.

Hiking around Blue Lakes. Making love. Him and I in the car rocking out to �Jumpin� Jack Flash�. Our first fight. Seeing an e-mail from him the next day with the word �Sorry� in the subject line and starting to cry. Doing the New York Times crossword puzzle together in bed. Me dragging him to art museums. Him dragging me to antique auto shows. Meeting his family. And yes, him meeting my mother (oh, the horror). And then coming home one day and finding my entire apartment filled with sunflowers and having him ask me to marry him. It would all have that kind of whirlwind quality to it.

He kind of smiled at me, and then started to walk away. I went around the other way, hoping to randomly meet up with him again. I did need to go shopping after all. Didn�t I? Not really. I had just kind of turned into the yuppie grocery store by habit. I had just wanted to buy some chocolate non-perils, and suddenly there was the man of my dreams. A tall, dark, curly haired man with horn rimmed glasses balancing deli trays.

I tried not to be obvious as I walked in parallel aisles. I got some grapes and a single bake potato. Do you think he would notice that? A SINGLE bake potato. Is that to obvious? Or too pathetic? Or too subtle? No, he seemed like a very intuitive fellow, in his corduroy jacket. I didn�t even know they still made corduroy jackets. And yet now that I was following him through the vegetable department, I started to wonder why they still weren't in style since he looked so dashing. It made him look like a writer. I mean, he had the corduroy jacket thing going. And the horn-rimmed glasses. And the sensible shoes. Maybe the deli trays were for his writer�s circle club. I write. Maybe I could join the club. Maybe I could get directions. You know. To the writer�s circle club. Attended by him. The guy in the corduroy jacket.

He did make a stop in the bakery department, so I went past him and headed towards the yogurts. You know, the ones he would eventually know my favorite flavors of. I stopped momentarily and picked up a jar of Kosher Pickles. I was trying to decide if $2.49 for a jar of pickles was too expensive. And then suddenly it was �Oh no!� Here he comes and I�m standing here holding a jar of Kosher Pickles. Is that too suggestive? Kosher Pickles. Him being Jewish and all. Maybe I could ask him, which Kosher Pickle is the best. I mean, he should know a thing or two about things that are Kosher. Being Jewish and all. Damn it. No wonder I�m still single, if that is all that I can come up with.

He was just about there. I wondered if he even knew it was me. The girl over in the deli. The one he had smiled at. He had to have seen me standing there holding a jar of Kosher Pickles and thinking how lovingly I was holding the Dill Spears. But no. He just walked by. But as he walked by I noticed he was whistling. Can you imagine? Was that so I would notice him when he breezed by me? It had to be. Why else would someone be whistling in the yuppie grocery store on a Sunday evening? So I quickly put the pickles down and followed him. His dark, curly head bobbed pleasantly, as he wove through the crowds. I was definitely falling in love with him by then. Definitely. His presence was so effortless.

I was just on the edge of the health food department, and I really wanted to get some Vitamin E, so I thought, Okay, I just make a quick jog over here and then I�ll continue my quest for the corduroy jacket guy, because it�ll only take a second. So I ducked into the vitamin department, grabbed some vitamin E, you know, something that would give me some vitality for the long evenings of lovemaking that were obviously imminent and then came back out onto the main concourse.

But was I able to find him when I walked back onto the main aisle? No. I looked up and down all the remaining aisles and could not find him. It was like he had been snatched by aliens. The guy in the corduroy jacket. The man with whom I could have lived out the rest of my life with happily. Gone. In a split second. I suddenly felt really depressed. When I walked through the bulk food department, I shoveled several large heaping spoonfuls of chocolate non-perils into a large plastic bag. At the checkout counter, I even bought a National Enquirer so that I could read about Angelina Jolie stealing Brad Pitt from Jennifer Aniston, so that I could at least commiserate with someone who was as unhappy as I was.

When I got out in the car, I started shoveling chocolate into my mouth...by the handful. So much for the calories burned on the treadmill. It was then that I turned on the radio, which was just starting to play the 60�s hit, �Born to be Wild�.

Born to be Wild...indeed.

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