The human touch

This is so much about being individualistic.
To each person his own.
I make my decisions. I live my life. In my terms. If I mess up, it’s my problem.
Half the world lives like that.
Kids pick it from their parents. That’s’ the way to live, but more so because they don’t have a choice, I think.
What are my choices?
Not that anything is wrong with that.
After all, it is your life, and eventually you alone are accountable to your life.
Where is the family? Somewhere, someplace. Even if they live within a mile of each other, the distance seems so far. Grandparents make no bones of the nuisance grandkids can be. So, it is rationed visits, rationed hugs.
There is the no warmth, no closeness felt and shared without reason. Just like that is a non-issue .except in mutually decided days of the year - like
Thanksgiving, Christmas, and a few other.oh, I love my family.
You lead your way, I will lead mine.
What’s wrong with that?
No, nothing!
After all ayn rand was right too about objectivity.
I don’t think there's anything wrong with that, except that people like me who come form a different planet, are astounded by the matter-of-fact aloofness. And the precise measure of distancing people, irrespective of who they are.
Movies, book and soaps reflect a different perspective though. People yearning for love from their family, lessons taught about valuing people not things. Use things, not people. Not the other way around. All normal values, any where in the world. The basics of human living.
That a surprise why?
Beneath the exteriors, aren’t we all the same? Emotions, longings, need to identify with, to belong, and to be loved and accepted uncondiontally?
I have been thinking of this lately.
Beats me still.

Recently I dined with a fairly big group and my dining experiences where we shared the food, gave me a subtle shift.

I have never been a big fan of Tortellini with its creamy sauce, but dining at San Francisco’s Buca di Beppo sure changes that. Someone else had ordered that. Or the 9 layer Lasagna for that matter (I cannot accept any lasagna as good, since the one I make comes out soooo bad. booo hoo!)

Someone else had ordered that too.

Generally too cheesy, too saucy, too Italian for me. I try to pair it with forkful of salads.
But this time the Lasagna was simply yummy. This is the only place where I can have meatballs and spaghetti without burying them in parmesan cheese or Pepper.
We chatted, and started with freshly made warm garlic bread with vinegar and olive oil, and went family style lunching. ordering large portions and sharing across the table.
This was a wee bit of surprise for me. Yes, this is a family style old Italian restraunta, and this is the way to eat here. Still.
I know all the people in my group for at least a year. I lunched a zillion times together.
Even shared home cooked food.
Yet.
Don’t know why.
The sharing of food, of simply sharing out of the same dish somehow gave me a surprisingly closeness. Couple of them mentioned it too.

What a nice way to have a meal. I think, apart from the great food, everyone likes it for the family experience it gives, simply sitting together and
Sharing food.
Yum.
And chatting
The restraunt was not serving any spinach at all due to the E. coli bacteria scare.
What if it’s well cooked, that should kill the bacteria?
Someone said, sure, it’ll kill the taste too!

The interesting feature of these restraunats is the old home-like setting and hangings on the walls.
With so many photographs occupying every inch of the wall, I simply had to crane my neck to see them better.
Most are harmless old pictures of life in supposedly southern Italy or the US. Kids with their families, boys with their bikes and cars. Women in the
50's swimwear, bright smiles. Families dining together, celebrity dining, and a few prominently placed naughty ones.
Among the chains, Olive Garden and The Old Spaghetti Factory are other favorites, but the experience here is the best.

We went lunching to another fine dining place for a birthday - frank fats.
Great food from Peking, Szechuan, sanghai and Cantonese cooking. Another nice to place to dine in with a big group. This time, all twelve of us
ordered different dishes and shared. We passed on plates, piling some of all the different dishes on our own.
Even the Ma Po tofu tasted good to me. We shared long beans, mango ginger chicken, scallops & shrimps with garlic minus the spinach again, honey walnut prawns among others. Sipping green tea all the while. I asked for the roast duck noodle.
Does sharing food get us together?
Is it just me, or just moments like these bring us closer?
We even shared the birthday ginger ice cream. Small pieces of freshly sliced ginger in creamy ice cream.
Sounds yucky, but tastes yummy. Really.
I think irrespective of what our societies do, and they way our lives are being driven, basic human contact does give us simple pleasure. Not fun. But happiness. The difference between the two is can be so deceiving at times. But not at times like these.

We are people who struggle to look beyond our noses for our happiness, yet that is where it is.