Ciao Fella

You’re at a party and the hour is getting late. The shrimp cocktails are curling from the heat lamps, forming rubberized appetizers devoid of taste, but not smell. The keg is kicked and most of the last stragglers have exited. You want to leave badly, but you can’t just slink out without saying goodbye first. Can you? Some do, some have. It’s a notoriously Hibernian departure, but by no means exclusive to those hailing from the unsunny Emerald Isle.

For some, leaving any event is a production unto itself. One involving handshakes, hugs, kisses, errant pinches, and hollow plans to “meet up sometime down the road to hash out a business plan.” That isn’t going to happen. The guy there with the friend who works at the big Hollywood studio was only being nice. You were blocking his way to the bathroom, creating an impossible-to-avoid conversation. He’s not going to read your experimental screenplay about Spiderman’s hasty retirement from crimefighting to become a professional seamster in the Garment district. You figure that eight arms are perfect for sewing, right? You’re not wrong, of course, but when have you ever seen Spiderman with more than two arms? You haven’t. 

There are times at even the classiest of fetes where the hosts politely ask you to leave, not the other way around. It’s for the best. Maybe you touched on a subject that was off limits. Or maybe you touched something that was off limits, like the pair of Giacomettis flanking their gorgeous patio. You’re not welcome anymore. It’s not that your generous gift to the charity of their choosing wasn’t appreciated, it’s just that the other guests are getting uncomfortable. Especially when you keep calling Giacometti “your favorite paisan” when everyone knows the sculptor was proudly Swiss. 

We should all get used to leaving, since it’s a fundamental part of living. You can’t expect a cot and a bedtime story at every red sauce joint from the Bronx to Staten. They have to close up eventually, to scrub the marinara out of the Snow White tablecloths or patch up any bullet holes leftover in the walls from tip disputes. 

Ideally, you flawlessly avoid the painful and pointless double goodbye, usually occurring in the foyer and then again in front of your car. You have nothing left to say, so you nod awkwardly and smile subtly. Because, as Smokey Robinson once asked, “what’s so good about goodbye?”