I just thought of another memorable NYE: my very last night at Tra Vigne. I worked there for five years, working my way up from host(ess) to manager and wine buyer, and my very last shift, my very last day, was NYE. I really did love that place when I was there, and I learned almost everything I now know about food and wine. (By the way, we've just come from dinner this evening, so I've had a little of both already.)
But by the time I left, I was ready to go. And then some. So that night was bittersweet. I recently came across a photo of me on my last night, in my very favorite Ann Taylor pinstriped suit, wearing a sequined paper tiara and a huge smile. I was standing on the bar with the general manager, and another manager, counting down the seconds.
The crowd had been particularly jovial and lively that night, and I think we had some Italian musicians strolling about. People were getting up and dancing, and the dining room and bar were jam-packed. All my friends had come down to the restaurant to take me home at shift's end. Mike was there. After the countdown and the noisemakers and the popping of a hundred corks, I strolled down the bar crying and kissed all the bartenders goodbye, hugging all of the managers and my work friends, and, like the big shepherd's crook in a vaudeville show, Mike's arm came out and hooked me and he carried me away.
That was tons of fun. THAT'S what NYE should be like. A great big, crying, laughing, loud, raucous farewell party to the old year, with love for friends and a spirit of adventure for the mysteries of the year ahead.
The next day, I woke up and shaved my head, and my friends and I watched movies and ate popcorn and candy all day, then went out to the reservoir to see the "rooster tail" plume of water that was rushing out of the spillway to the dam from the torrential rains the week before.
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