Otto, the garage attendant, talks to me everyday as I'm coming or going from the office about the coffee girl he visits every Saturday. He is enchanted by this woman. He likes her eyes, her smile, her butt and her manner. She plays coy, and even though he has asked for her phone number, she does not refuse him but does not accept him. He returns every Saturday, and she goes out of her way to bring him coffee, even if another server is helping him.
This past Saturday she did not say hello, and acted as if he wasn't there, but when she was cashing someone out at the register she was standing near him, smiling, looking into a reflective glass and enjoying the fact that Otto was watching her. This may all be in Otto's head. She is in the hospitality industry and it is part of her job to smile at guests and take care of their needs. She is supposed to be sensual and inviting and warm. He wants to date her but is enjoying the chase, he studies her behavior and watches how she watches him. They are chasing each other without moving. They are taking their time.
We talk, sometimes for 20 minutes, while my car is running. Ocassionally I turn the engine off if I've got the time. Mostly I sit peering up out of my window and watch him inflect and use expressive hand gestures. He speaks with an accent, and I can't recall which region of Latin America he's from but I always enjoy that shifty, energetic manner of speech that comes from translating. He wants to talk about his thoughts. All of them.
Otto finds something brilliant in the people he interacts with. He studies eyes and hands and stances. He knows when I'm in a rush and he knows when I am able to understand him. I want to see this cafe that he visits after church every Saturday. I want to see the beautiful woman that has grabbed his attention so forcefully. I want to stand on the side and watch him drink his espresso. I want to see the way that she walks past him and how exactly her eyes play with his heart. I want to watch his other mode involved in a dance of hearts with this stranger woman I'll never know. I want to be there when Otto plays out his emotions in cool, calm reserve, stoic in waiting for the moment to arrive when she decides that his love is enough.
And I want to see if she goes home to someone who already has her in their grasp, and what manner of affection she receives from her already-lover-- whether it's as significant as the dreams Otto shares with me through the window of my car as I'm going to park before hours of race-discrimination investigation work at the office.
A song of Love, a parody, for your efforts in reading this blog:
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