Like A Bird In Flight

Dinner at Salute is always a welcome night out but this time it was not at our suggestion.We arrived at Higgs beach in daylight on a perfect Spring evening in Key West. I have no doubt that for many from Up North the temperature and the warmth of the evening air would have constituted summer and perhaps too warm but we all appreciated the perfect mix of low humidity and cool breeze at the beach front table.

It was an evening when I was introduced once again to the art of drawing out the waitress. Sydney suddenly sat up like a cat whose tail has been trodden upon and when the young woman approached with the formulaic "Anything else I can ge...?" he pounced on the offending bland syllables and started a rant that deserved a recording device to do it justice. Sounding like a disappointed Sergeant Major on the parade ground he demanded to know why we weren't deserving of real feelings from our server. "Giving us the corporate line," was one quotation that stuck in my anti-corporate brain. Which was funny because not ten minutes earlier the owner of the place, the fabulously successful Richard Hatch stopped by the table to receive plaudits from the frequent fliers soaring round the table and they were suitably hail-fellow-well-met with the source of the corporate greetings that had so offended the delightful Sydney. Deborah put her head in her hands with a hissed "Oh Sydney!" and I sat and looked straight ahead trying not to remember similar scenes from my childhood when my wretched father wanted to smoke in public where it was not allowed. The waitress was brilliant and in some manner that I missed she deflected it all and took the stage. Sydney sat back triumphant, a bland evening service at table had been salvaged and as the architect he deserved our thanks and he knew it. It was almost as though April First had come round again and Sydney and Rhiannon had been in collusion on the whole stage set up.
From Up North on the East Coast some six or more years ago Rhiannon, named for a Fleetwood Mac song, joined her father on his South African built Lyle Hess designed Channel Cutter and sailed to Key West, like a bird in flight living up to the character whose burden she now bears for life. He died, she stayed and lives on with his memory enshrined in her boat still docked on Stock Island. Time for photographs all round amidst the merriment. "Do you plan to stay in Key West?" I asked, wondering if travel by sail might be in her future. She looked down at me archly: "I married a Conch," she said simply. "Whaddya think?" Sydney twinkled at me. "Could have gone either way," I said, once again speaking my mind and wishing I hadn't. "I wish I had the nerve to do that." Deborah looked at me startled as though such withdrawal from the field of combat were an option. My wife never ceases to be astonished that making scenes in public is not my cup of tea at all.
Some people want to know the name of the people waiting at table and their life stories- me? I over tip and mutter the usual little prayer "there but for the grace of god go I" and shuffle off back to my privacy as fast as my little legs will carry me. The fact is I walk in awe of people like Sydney who can stage manage a moment like the conductor of an orchestra but a conductor who leads without any sheet music to direct the outcome. I hope before I die I can pull off a treat as he did at Salute. The Pasta Carbonara was just fine too, thank you for asking.