We sat in chrome barstool chairs at black lacquer café tables. A blue-tinged barely lit bar. I’m approached with the offer to join the bar’s martini club by dark-clad servers sporting red-carpet hair and lean physiques uncharacteristic to this part of the US.
Martinis are not my drink. At the time I was living in a lifeless city that didn’t suit me. I look around, and as I contemplate the club offer, I’m swept away to New York, Milan or Montreal. Of course, I want to join the martini club.
How the mind works! Without my martini purse (pictured) as a writing prompt, I’m convinced the memory of that short-lived fantasy would have been lost forever.
I’m inclined to try one of the dessert martinis. I like sugar. However, I’d learned long ago at a regrettable girls’ night out that dessert martinis are not dessert.
Treat that yum-coction of creams, syrups and alcohol like a second helping of chocolate lava cake and you will drop.
I studied the list of 50 signature martinis on the club punch card. Overwhelmed by the volume of choices and clever names, I asked to be served anything “festive and not bitter.”
The work colleague I had convinced to join me on this excursion ordered “Duck ‘n’ Run” from the menu. The name made her laugh.
I had enjoyed two martinis (likely more the delusion of living in a viable city) while my colleague nursed her “Duck ‘n’ Run” like a snail on ludes. “Why aren’t you drinking?” I asked. “Don’t you like it?”
“It’s strong,” she said, then giggled. “If I drink it any faster I won’t be able to drive home.” She asked me if I had seen the ingredients in “this thing,” then offered me a sip. I made a mental note never to order “Duck ‘n’ Run.”
Martini Club rules: a punch card with all 50 martini names. For every 15 martinis purchased in a three-month period the bar gifts you one free.
I was up to seven punches when the martini bar closed for good. Quel dommage.
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Purses carry memory. A friend gifted me one that her late mother had given her: small, red, beaded satin with a gold-tone clasp and matching handle.
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My purses are mobile scrapbooks filled with wrappers and receipts, business cards, and torn scraps scribbled with reminders.
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