The wedding, the buffet, and the plate I didn’t finish

Dear You,

The reception started at six and the dinner was a buffet, which I knew in advance because I read invitations the way other people read contracts. Buffets used to be my favorite format. Now they are an obstacle course designed by someone who has never met my appetite.

I was at table nine, between a cousin of the groom and a woman named Carol who, I learned within four minutes, had opinions.

The plate

Here’s what I did at the buffet, and it’s what I do at every buffet now. I walked the whole line first without a plate. Reconnaissance. Then I went back and took small amounts of the three things that looked best, plus one roll, because the rolls were warm and I have standards. Chicken, green beans with almonds, a spoon of the potato thing. The plate was about a third full. Next to everyone else’s, it looked like a plate someone had already eaten from.

I used to feel I had to fill the plate to look normal. What I’ve found is that nobody is looking at your plate as closely as you fear. Except Carol.

Carol

Carol watched me eat. Not subtly. She watched the way you watch someone parallel park, with interest and a readiness to comment.

Around the fourth bite she said, “Is that all you’re having?” Friendly. Curious. The way people are when they’ve decided your business is a shared resource.

I said, “Yes, I’m eating light tonight. The chicken’s good though.” And I ate another bite of the chicken, to demonstrate that I was, in fact, a person who ate chicken.

She tried again during the toasts, in a whisper. “You’ve lost weight, haven’t you? What’s the secret?” Toasts are a terrible time for this question and a wonderful time to deflect, because you can gesture at the best man and raise your eyebrows as though to say, we’re missing it. So I did that. Then I said, quietly, “Just taking care of myself. I’ll tell you what, the cake is going to be the real test.” She laughed. Carol wanted to be in on something. I gave her the cake.

The cake

I had the cake. A small piece, three bites, the frosting mostly. It was good. I didn’t finish it.

Some days you’ll finish the bowl. Some days three bites is dinner. Both count. This was a three-bites-of-cake night, and I let it be one, and I didn’t explain it to anyone, including Carol, including myself.

The plate I didn’t finish went back to the kitchen with half a roll and most of the potato thing still on it. A year earlier that would have felt like a failure in one direction or the other: either I’d wasted food or I’d lacked willpower, depending on which voice was loudest. That night it just felt like a plate. A plate that had done its job, which was to let me sit at table nine and be at a wedding.

The dance floor

Here’s the part I actually want to tell you about.

Around nine, after the cake, the DJ played the song every wedding DJ plays, and I got up. I did not used to get up. I used to be the person who held the purses and the phones and said “I’m good, go ahead,” and meant the opposite. Dancing in a body that felt like a borrowed suit was not something I did in front of people.

I danced for an hour. Badly, enthusiastically, with the groom’s grandmother for one song. I wasn’t thinking about the buffet or the plate or Carol or the cake. I was thinking about the next song. My shirt stuck to my back and I didn’t care who saw it.

That’s the trade I didn’t expect when this started. I thought I was trading food for a smaller body. What I actually traded was a certain amount of appetite for a certain amount of presence. The buffet got smaller. The night got bigger.

Carol, if you’re reading this, the chicken really was good. And you’re a fine dancer.

Want to tell me something? Reply to any Low Volume email, or write to me here. I read everything.

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