Never Walked In High Heels

            It is a long held tradition that a woman my age should be restless until she finds her match. And I do feel this pull as much as anyone, but recently I’ve been fortunate enough to have a small piece of  this hole filled in the strangest and most arbitrary way imaginable.

             It all started at a pub. All good stories in England start this way as a possible explanation for the most unlikely events.  Without such a preface the events that follow would  seem far fetched, this way it provides an excuse. Anyway, I had visited the S&W for a friend’s birthday and I had seemed to have overstayed my welcome. Not according to the pub, mind you. But whereas at midnight Cinderella’s carriage turned into a pumpkin, here in London the transit system becomes completely inaccessible. I got out of the pub just in time to see the last accessible boat leave the pier. I had just entered my own personal Twilight Zone where nothing is accessible and the world isn’t ready for a young red head in a wheelchair.

Ninety minutes and six phone calls to cab companies later, I was waving from a black cab at the men from the S&W who had found me a ride home. Chivalry was not dead, it had merely gone out for a drink after becoming very bored. It was at that point that I decided to visit the old pub a bit more often.

Over the next few months my roommate and I would visit the S&W two or three times a week. I would get to listen to stories from the men about their day, or join in debates. I would watch them play darts while I would perch on the leather couches and laugh at their insults. The greeting I would get when coming through the door was irreplaceable.

But what the men at the S&W gave me or  rather give me every time I visit the constant reiteration that I am a woman of great value and worthy of respect. For most young women  this particular gap can only be filled with a masculine influence. When a good guy is not readily available often time standards will get lowered just so the loneliness is filled. And to our own fault, sometimes we are so busy looking for an idealized version of romance that we miss the many other facets of love right in front of us. The S&W reminds me to stop looking and start seeing. It is one of the few places in this city where I feel most like myself.

After eleven the pub technically closes. But the owner allows us to stay later so long as we keep buying drinks. I am far from done debating with a gentleman who must be some reincarnation of Hemingway. The chef has locked the bartender in the alcohol cage in some sort of ritualistic joke that never is funny but never gets old. Another game of Killer starts out on the dart board.

And I know, if I wanted it, any one of them would see me safely home.