You’ll never believe where I spent Christmas Day and New Year’s Eve... or perhaps you will, if you’ve read of my love affair with Buckhead’s Southern Art, follow my Twitter feed or peek into my life on Facebook.
Well, there: I’ve given it away, at least in part.
I was happily alone for Christmas Eve, relaxing with a holiday-appropriate fire as my cats and the dogs peacefully roamed the house while I watched holiday-appropriate movies on the TV. I thought I might spend Christmas Day in the same manner when I woke the next morning and made the second holiday fire, the scent of burning wood simply irresistible to me as I relaxed in peace and comfort at my parents’ home in Atlanta. It’s one of the things I love most about the house where I grew up; one of those scents that, on long, cool walks after the temperature drops, makes me draw long draughts of breath through my nose just to smell it again and again.
I checked my iPhone for emails ....
Oh wait; let’s back up. I’ve forgotten the day-before-Christmas-Eve, the Twenty-Third, or, as it’s been newly related to me:
Christmas Adam Eve (because Adam came before Eve…)
Lenox Mall was not quite mad, though it was very busy. I found myself dizzy at the number of scurrying people and their children, bustling through stores and along the pathways to here-and-there (though it was probably just the raised temperature of the mall with so many people and I was a bit dehydrated). I was not shopping as they were; I was visiting the mall deliberately, if ridiculously, with the purpose of getting my Mac Technology fixed at the Apple Store, and to see the mall I’d not visited since my late teens.
It's hardly food (though the name would imply differently), but I find it hard to resist spilling into a review of Apple's Genius Bar. If you've resisted visiting the Bar, as I have, for reasons of time or fear of failure as a result of dealing with incompetence in other computer-related issues, I highly recommend making an appointment online for even the smallest of inconveniences with any of your Apple devices. The appointment-making is so easy, and the Apple Techs I witnessed at the Bar are so hospitable, so ready to spend time correcting and explaining even the smallest of problems that it is almost desirable to wish an issue with one's Apple device.
I spent a full forty-five minutes with my Tech, who tested and reset my obstinate iPhone, discussed with me the potential causes and ultimately did little more than explain to me things on my Mac and iPhone that I probably could have understood had I listened to a fourteen-year-old boy I know. C'est la vie; I'm as obstinate as my device, it seems, and I did enjoy the affirmation of my favorite tech company's obvious place in the hearts of the world's tech-users.
Blissful now, and having come to the mall from a lunch overpowered by my reunion with one friend at downtown Duluth’s PURE Taqueria (a decent meal of well-seasoned veggie tacos with salad and black beans, one of the day’s specials, which would have been improved had the soft corn tortillas been seasoned and perhaps lightly pan-fried in the traditional Mexican way, and made to keep from falling apart as one eats), I did not anticipate eating again until I returned to Duluth. And: I had not heard anything in answer to the invitation I’d sent to my other Buckhead foodie friend.
But there to surprise me as I happily walked out of Apple at Lenox, corrected tools in hand, stood my friend. I was thrilled; this day was just getting better.
I am convinced that some restaurants and their food are destined only to be background, and perhaps that’s best, since sometimes the conversation and company are far too important or enjoyable to be distracted. Dinner was like that: again, decent but forgettable, though the impression of our conversation and friendship not so easily. We chatted and chattered over a small meal of hushpuppies and goat cheese in a marinara with garlic bread, and caught up for three months apart.
Should I be ashamed to say it? Being in Buckhead almost implies a visit to Southern Art, it seems; and, if not a visit, then certainly a fond head-turn as memories swarm through my mind. With dinner satisfactorily in our bellies, our talk fell back into recollections of how my friend and I met at Southern Art’s bourbon-tasting class with head bartender Clay Livingston, and we decided to have dessert - and bourbon, of course - at our favorite spot.
Forgive me if I’m predictable, for Southern Art and the Bourbon Bar are truly wonderful for this classical girl who loves a strong man’s drink, who loves to indulge in classical and classy tastes with classical and classy people. Southern Art is so much of the mix I adore: a lovely melding of the modern and traditional South, and it feels like being home, like being with a part of myself that I hold dear.
So we enjoyed, again, as much of their Twelve-Layer Red Velvet Cake as we could possibly manage after having dinner, paired beautifully by none other than Mr. Livingston’s choice of bourbon for each of us.
The wonderful thing about going out on Christmas Adam Eve is the absence of so many other guests, even at reasonable times of the night; and it was not long before we - or rather, my friend - had Clay and his second bartender all to “ourselves” for conversation.
My second somewhat-guilty confession is that, whenever I indulge in amazing food or beverages, I become rather single-minded and it becomes quite impossible for me to participate in much of any polite conversation. My mind reeled at Clay’s pairing of Calumet Farm Bourbon with the Red Velvet: the sweet, smooth, burnt-caramel-and-cherry bourbon cleansed my palate in such a lovely way as the creamy richness of cream-cheese-and-chocolate begged me to return for yet another bite. Thank goodness I am not a glutton and instead am rather vain about my appearance, for it would be easy from such settings to overindulge; I took the other half of the cake with me to enjoy after a small dinner alone on Christmas Eve.
…Which brings me again to our beginning, and then to…
Christmas Day.
(Look for it in Part Two, you silly gluttons of words and experience... with my fondness for all of my readers and apologies for the long hiatus, though some things in life are just demanded....)
Wishing all of your holidays and winters (or summers) are as lovely as they can be.
