New York Diary

On Bars

In Ithaca, there's a bar on Stewart Avenue called the Chapter House. If there isn't a band playing, you can go in, get a drink, and head for the back room, where you're sure to get a seat to yourself from which to sip your beer and watch the baseball game.

In Washington, DC, it's harder to find seating at The Brickskeller. Once, I even sat at a Pac-Man table, my beer in the way of anyone who might actually have wanted to play the game. Once seated, however, it's easy to unfold a newspaper or to pull out a pen and to start working. People are polite--friendly even--but they understand that you have come to the bar to do whatever it is that you want to do, and they let you do it.

New York is not like this.

Yesterday night, I went to Brady's, a cozy and comfortably un-chic establishment a block from my apartment. My main reasons for going to Brady's were to 1) have a drink in a reasonably nice space and in a way that could not be mistaken for Drinking Alone in My Apartment; and 2) watching some baseball on TV. (I should explain here that I neither own a TV nor care to own one. I do, however, have a desire to watch Yankees games, especially since the team is duking it out with Boston over the division championship just now.) Annoyingly, however, I was propositioned by four men in a two-hour period at this bar. I went home with business cards (a bizarre New York phenomenon), phone numbers, and several offers of free drinks (all of which I had declined).

Now, don't get me wrong. I have nothing against meeting new people who live near me. Indeed, I enjoyed myself immensely while talking with Nick and James, two guys who seemed to understand the concept of "Sorry, I'm just here to watch the game," and I really do hope to see them again sometime. What I am averse to is the seemingly-ubiquitous idea that a single girl at a bar must be there to find a guy, and not even remotely for any other reason--even if she says explicitly that she is there to watch baseball. Wouldn't it make sense to believe the girl? I mean, either she's telling the truth or she's rejecting you, and neither makes it seem like she really wants you to take her to dinner next week (and yes, I was asked, after saying I was uninterested).

As I said, I'd like to meet up with Nick and James again sometime. I predict that it'll be a while before I seem them, though. I won't be back at Brady's in a long while.

posted by Skay @ 1:40 PM