A Table for One, Please!

"I've just finished work and I felt like eating pizza today...so I came to rossopomodoro." 

"Ok. Good." 

Silence. The phone connection was perfect. Silence, just silence.

"But... Are you having dinner alone at Rossopomodoro?"

"Yes, I am! Why?"

"You're so corageous! How can you do that?

"Easy. I came in and there was a table for one still available on a Friday night, not the best table but since they cook my favourite  pizza,  I took it, and here  I am."

"Uau! I wish I could do that!"

"The waiter already  asked for you, by the way."

For my boyfriend, booking a table for one is an act of courage! If you book it on a Friday night that's an act of heroism! I always had dinners and lunches on my own, I never felt unconfortable or weird, but now he is making me too aware of it. 

Recently I went to another place, a Japanese restaurant and, again, I went on my own. The waiter asked for George as well. I said to him, George had to travel for a week or two. I came back to the same restaurant three weeks later and, at this point, George hadn't come back from his trip yet. The waiter became suspicious. I introduced the restaurant to some friends who loved the place and now the staff started confirming their suspicious thoughts.

"She's boring, she always chooses the same from the menu. I knew he wouldn't come back from his trip! He left her!"

I think George made me too aware of the courageous act of having a Curry Laksa on my own in a restaurant. It never crossed my mind thinking of what other people might think about it. But now I'm even googling and writing about it!

I never felt lonely doing things on my own. I love it. Recently I said to someone:

- "I am going to take the train to visit the place X and I'll spend the afternoon there"

- "Hum... Are you OK?  Do you need time for yourself?"

- "Well... It's not necessarily a need and I am not  necessarily excluding the possibility  of having company. It's something I decided to do without creating a Facebook event for it."

I love social events. I love people and dinners and shopping with friends, a good conversation and family gatherings. But my solitude is also fantastic. Sometimes I try to name it, I try to label this duplicity, a mix of introversion and extroversion. I like to have this balance. 

When I'm in a restaurant on my own,  people talking in the background,  the staff... Those details are a company to me. I could stay at home but it wouldn't be the same!