Blogger's Note: October will be Polish grandparents month. On Thursday, October 10th, DJ and I will be heading to O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, IL to pick up Joanna's parents. They'll be staying with us for a month. We can't wait. They are a big help with their grandchildren. They stayed with us right after Roman was born, and I don't think I realized at the time exactly how much help they were!
If you're just tuning in, this feature is the next chapter in our "How We Fell in Love" story. If you'd like to really understand what's going on, then I'd suggest scrolling through the archives until you come across "Chapter 1 - The Tea Monster" where our story begins.
And now... let's be clear about something...
This story is a romantic comedy.
People tune in for various reasons. Some (I really hope) tune in to see what silly thing I'm posting about this week. Some (as my viewership graph indicates) tune in solely to read this story (...and that's okay because information like this tells me in which direction to lean if I'm going to keep people coming back.) Some tune in because I've managed to solicit my post cleverly enough to make people wonder what exactly it is that I'm writing about. And some tune in to see if they will be making a cameo appearance... especially in our "How We Fell in Love" story.
And any of these reasons is perfectly fine with me. I'm just glad you tuned in.
I haven't really had the chance to include everyone that I'd like to... yet. But, please, stay tuned and bear with me.
Our story isn't just about "How We Fell in Love". But, also about how our friends helped us every step of the way. You will see this especially during Phase 3 of our journey.
But, now it's time for the romantic part of our romantic comedy. So I'll begin with a "mushy" warning in this chapter and the next. I hope you'll endure these steps with me, so we can get back to our regularly scheduled program as painlessly as possible...
113... 115... 117...
I knew I was at the right room because I could hear Joanna speaking Polish through the door. I gently knocked and waited.
"Już mu wysłałam papiery, może się odczepi!" Her anxious voice grew louder just before the door opened. She was holding her cell phone to her ear while waving a stack of papers in her free hand.
"Come in..." She pulled the phone away from her mouth long enough to encourage me inside. I quietly obliged.
"Nie przejmuj się, jest dupek i tyle!" I could distinguish a female voice coming through the phone's speaker sounding just as passionate as Joanna.
"Hej muszę kończyć. Kumpel właśnie przyszedł." Joanna must have said goodbye as she ended the call and stuck the phone in her purse which sat on a table near the window. She afforded me a smile as she put the papers in a file that was sitting on the lone table.
"Are you really a spy?" I quipped.
"Don't tell anyone or I must kill you," she responded with playful, suspicious eyes. She busied herself by appropriating some of the paperwork to various files. "That was Wiola, my friend in Destin. Our boss is driving us crazy!"
"Raul the Irishman?"
"Yes. Neither of us can stand him. The students are crammed into rooms. Some of them sleep on the floor. Now, he wants me to let one of them stay with me. I tell him 'hell no.' That was not part of contract agreement. And we have no car, and the students need things. I need things. I tell him to quit being cheap and pay for another room. You should know how much money this company makes, and you would know why I am so angry that he won't help us."
The room had two beds. One was made up nicely; the other was obviously her desk as it was covered with stacks of folders and papers. In the corner, a stack of clothes was neatly folded and stacked in a large, open suitcase. A nice blouse lounged from a hanger that was clinging to an edge of the mirror. I noticed that there was neither a refrigerator nor a microwave.
"No microwave? How do you eat?" I inquired.
"There's one in the lobby," she explained.
I spotted an off-duty bottle of vodka resting on the dresser's edge. Beside it, another vodka bottle was filled with a thick custard-like substance. "What's that?" I asked.
"Adwokat. My dad makes it; he sent me some for Christmas. It is illegal to ship an open container of alcohol internationally. So he puts it in vodka bottle and puts plastic over the lid so that it look like it has never opened," Joanna resolved. "Here, try some..."
She opened one of the dresser drawers and retrieved two shot glasses.
After pouring, she handed me one of the glasses and toasted, "na zdrowie."
"Na zdrowie," I echoed.
The adwokat tasted a bit like egg nog, just not as sweet. I could feel heat from the vodka warming me from my core to my head. "Nice..." I complimented. Given the opportunity, I could have happily sat there and finished the bottle myself.
"Ready?" Joanna asked as she took our empty glasses to the bathroom sink to wash out.
"Now I am," I joshed.
She bundled herself in a long coat and freed her pony tail from a scarf that she loosely draped around her neck.
We headed out the door. "You'll have to excuse my piece of shit car," I apologized as I jingled my keys out of my pocket.
"I do not care about that sort of thing. At least you have a car..." she smiled at me.
I jerked the passenger-side door open partially because I thought the gesture would be polite and partially because I was afraid she wouldn't be able to do it. The door was compromised by a dent and rusty hinges. She smiled her appreciation as she sat in the passenger seat. I slammed the door shut hoping it would latch on the first try. Thankfully, it did.
We escaped the hotel parking lot and slowly accelerated into a cold, Spring night making small talk about work. I listened uncharacteristically well because I liked hearing her talk.
Whaler's Catch was busy, but we didn't have to wait long for a table. An engaging Zydeco band was crooning from overhead speakers giving a taste of New Orleans to nautical decorations. A pretty, young hostess carrying two menus led us through a labyrinth of candlelit tables to a corner where a red-and-white checkered tablecloth was being caressed by lantern-light. Chivalrous, wooden chairs softly rapped across the floor with personality as we found our seats.
"Our special tonight is all-you-can-eat crab legs," the girl explained as she handed us our menus.
"Yay!" I said as my grin widened. Joanna gave me a well-all-righty-then smile as she started reading the menu's massive selection.
"There's so many choices," she commented as she scanned the options.
"Can I get you something to drink?" A middle-aged lady wearing a business smile politely interrupted.
"What do you suggest?" Joanna looked over her menu to address me.
"I don't normally drink Foster's, but they have it on draught here. I've discovered that I like it on draught."
"I'll try that." The Polish girl ordered.
"Bring us two tall ones," I simplified.
Once the waitress had left, Joanna returned to the menu.
"You don't like shellfish, right? This is regular fish," I indicated by waving my hand over the correct section.
A quiet time elapsed as she read the options, apparently struggling with the strange English words. Suddenly, she made a face.
"Catfish? What's that?"
"Really? You've never had catfish?" I reflected on that a moment. Catfish was a staple of American cuisine. I had never considered the possibility that there were people in the world that didn't know what it was.
"I don't believe we have catfish in Poland," Joanna responded.
"It's very common here. There's some swimming in the river right over there," I gestured towards the Ohio River which was just a block away. "It's called catfish because it looks like it has whiskers like a cat," I explained. "And it meows when you bite into it."
She gave me that look, so I regressed with a chuckle. "Ok, ok. But it really does have whiskers like a cat."
"What does it taste like," she asked.
"It has a very mild flavor. If you like fish, I think you would like it. Most people around here eat it fried."
"I will try it," she decided as she folded the menu and sat it on the table.
After the waitress returned, she placed our mammoth beers in front of us and took our orders.
"You look happy. You must like crab legs," Joanna surmised.
"They're my favorite food," I beamed. "I hope you're patient. They take a while to eat."
She just smiled and took a sip from the gigantic, frosty mug.
"What's wrong?" I asked. "You don't seem yourself tonight..."
"This job. I want to tell Raul what I think of him."
"Why don't you?"
"I'm under contract." Joanna's default response resurfaced.
"What does that mean?"
"It means that if I quit I lose my visa."
"So you lose your visa, and you go back to Poland? Sounds like a win/win if you hate your job," I submitted.
Industrious restaurant noises substituted her silence and bridged her retort. My gaze mercifully broke when I recognized a furlough into memory as indicated by her hollow stare. I took a drink of Australian beer and patiently waited.
"I love my parents, my family..." she commenced the explanation only to pause again, but this time only briefly. "I love them. I lived with them. I worked as a secretary for a furniture warehouse. One day, I see an advertisement on the bulletin board to 'see the world.' I go to work every day, and I see the same advertisement. And I wonder what it is. So I called the number on it. It was this job. They were looking for people like me to supervise these foreign exchange students. They mail me the contract, and I sign it. I did not tell my parents until I had a plane ticket in my hand. They were so angry and worried...
"You see, they are very controlling. Because they love me. They don't mean to be. But they make all of my decisions, because I am their daughter. And they wish the best for me. And they think they know what is best for me. The day I leave, my mother cry so hard that I almost didn't go. And when I landed in New York I realized I didn't know English as well as I think. I didn't understand them at all. I was so scared..."
The pretty, Polish girl looked like she was about to start crying. Hell, I was about to start crying. I respected her need for composure.
"You have coch or pessy?"
An Asian lady at a table near us was talking to a tall, slender young man with dark hair. He was apparently her server. He looked as flabbergasted as we were.
"Coch. or. Pessy??" the Asian lady reiterated.
Joanna and I shared a humored glance and sat up to hear the response from the confused waiter.
When a look of sudden understanding dawned on the employee's face, he finally responded. "Oh. We have Coke products!" he exhaled the answer with a sigh of relief.
"Ok.. I have a Coch no ass!"
With a smug visage of comprehension, the server wrote on his pad of tickets. "A Coke, no ice. Got it. Anything else?"
"I give you ress of orduh when you comuh back with Coch!"
Joanna and I just started laughing. The ice breaker that we needed came from another table, but we welcomed it nevertheless.
After we regained our composure, Joanna was the first to invest in conversation. "You know, Enrique doesn't like that we are hanging out."
"So I noticed. What's up with that?" I asked.
"He and I go on a date. One date. That's all it take before I realize he an idiot."
I chuckled as our server came back with a large plate of snow crab legs that she sat in front of me; a nice portion of catfish was placed at Joanna's setting.
"Anything else for now?" the waitress asked.
"I think we're set. Thank you," I answered.
After the lady walked away, Joanna pointed at her hushpuppies and asked, "what's that?"
"Hushpuppies," I explained. "They're balls of fried cornmeal with pieces of onion in them."
She tried a bite. "Not bad," she declared.
I fell into a thought as I cracked open my first crab leg. I considered all of the places and things around here that Joanna might not have seen before. Without meaning to, I began creating a mental checklist of things she should see and do while she was here. And each item that I'd think of would branch two more items until I suddenly felt like I had a mission. Catfish and hushpuppies were the tip of a very large iceberg that I was going to introduce her to.
She finished her meal long before me, but she sat there patiently while I put away plate after plate of crab legs. She drank her beer, and we talked. Then I drank my beer, and we talked some more. We never struggled for conversation; we talked about everything.
Something had nudged my lion's heart awake. It stretched, then yawned. And then winked open an eye.
(to be continued...)
Continue our "How We Fell in Love" story:
Chapter 7 - Spring
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