The Day I Really Became a New Yorker (of One Type)

Yes, I know what I've titled this blog, but for five or so years now "New Yorker" was more in the resident sense than the "I am a part of it" sense. That changed yesterday at the fish counter in the recently reorganized Harlem Fairway cold room. I had the headphones on, listening to Magnetic Fields, as the woman currently being served completed what seemed to be an unnecessarily complicated purchase of a couple fish fillets. This went on for another minute or so, during which time I took off the headphones, another customer, a smartly dressed woman in her fifties, drifted up to the counter, and the worker completed her sale and while punching up the code said, "Who's next?"

The later arriving customer immediately began to place her order. I, irritated by much of my day thus far and suddenly no longer the tolerant patsy, said, "Excuse me, I was here first." The woman reacted with that classic New Yorker exaggerated and exasperated sigh, the one that means "oh, all right, if you're going to trample on my right to jump ahead of you in the line, please go ahead," (some Parisians do the same thing when caught out, only the fashion there is pursing the lips and blowing an audible puff of air through them) to which I replied, "I'm sorry, but I was" and gave my order, a couple of tilapia filets for a nice recipe I do with cherries and toasted almonds. It took all of thirty seconds and when done, I resisted the temptation to say to Ms. Annoyed, "See that wasn't so bad, was it?" I'm a big boy after all.