Yesterday, I arrived at Café Saint-Ex, a self-described “charming restaurant and lounge.” After waiting at the bar with my male companion, the host seated us and informed us that our waiter would be by shortly. The waiter approached from behind. “Hey guys,” he said, wheeling around to face us. “Oh, God, uhh, wrong choice of words,” the waiter said, nervously darting his eyes at my face. “I saw the short hair and—I just assumed,” he continued. He apologized, asked for our drink order, and took leave of us.

It wasn’t the first time a stranger had confused me for a dude—the short hair, etc.—and I’m not often unsettled by a slip-up. In this case, however, the sheer awkwardness of the encounter was stunning: The waiter, after mistaking me for a man, had apologized for referring to us with an entirely gender-neutral greeting. When he returned to read off the daily specials, we both stared at him with open jaws.

“What the fuck?” we asked each other, when the waiter had left again. Was he so freaked out by mistaking my gender that he couldn’t even use a gender-neutral term to describe me? And why did it feel so fucking weird? The waiter studiously avoided us for the rest of the meal, only dropping by our table when necessary. But we couldn’t shake the encounter.

“I’m going to go to the bathroom,” I said, at one point.

“Which one?” my companion asked.

At the end of the meal, we split the check. The waiter took care to lay out the receipts according to our genders, returning the female credit card to me, and the male credit card to the man. But I won’t soon forget what he had said after our initial encounter. In a sweep of the room, he noticed our glasses were half-empty: “I’ll get you guys some more water,” he told us.

What the fuck?

Photo by Daquella manera

On the U Street Listserv this morning, Washington Post Staff Writer Theola Labbé-DeBose solicits “ex wives and new wives who get along”:

Hi, for a potential Mother’s Day feature I’m looking for local Ex-wives and New wives who get along! The women should be able to talk freely about what it took to get their relationship on a positive note. If you or someone you know fits this bill, and they live in DC-MD-VA please reply to me at labbet@washpost.com.

Thanks,
Theola

Since the situation warrants an exclamation point, I’m betting this holiday-themed piece will have a good layer of bitchy female rivalry beneath its grinning facade. But wouldn’t a real Mother’s Day present from WaPo be a piece on chummy ex- and new husbands? Certainly there are just as many men in this situation as there are women. My suspicion is that WaPo wouldn’t find the stories of male rivalry sufficiently catty to warrant a piece. Or maybe WaPo’s just waiting until next month to roll that story out for Father’s Day?

Photo by Cosmic Kitty

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“Hey, baby girl,” he remarked to the woman sitting across from him.

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“I’m half-Cuban, half-Cherokee, half-brother,” he informed her.

“Wow, three halves,” she replied. The half-Cuban, half-Cherokee, half-brother inquired as to whether she would like to party with him that evening. The Baby Girl declined. She and her male companion disembarked at the next stop.

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“Everyone on this bus,” he announced. “I apologize for my inflammatory statements and for the tone of my voice. I am sorry. I am. It was bad. It was not right.”

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“I apologized,” he continued, speaking now only to himself. “I made a public speech. I said I was sorry.”

Photo by Darrow Montgomery