March 9: "Table for One''

Her name is Victoria. That’s really all I know about her because that’s really all she has permitted me to know.

I began to notice her after I had been on campus about a week. It seemed as though every time I turned a corner there she was. Somehow, our schedules sort of converged. When I arrived at the cafeteria for breakfast, here she came, too. Same for lunch. In my travels from one class to another, I would look up and find her walking toward me.

So I introduced myself one morning, noted that we always seemed to be running into each other, and told her my name. She told me hers and that was pretty much the whole conversation.

She is a beautiful girl. Maybe it’s a deception of the heart, but she has a striking resemblance to a girl I used to think I loved – only Victoria is a brunette and about 30 years younger than that person. She, too, reminds me of my own daughter, Abby. Like Abby, she seems to have an indefinable quality that draws people to her.

Yes, Victoria is a beautiful girl, all right. And she is the best kind of beautiful, you know? I am certain that she is aware of her beauty, for she is always neatly dressed and carefully groomed. You never see her in a ball cap with a pony-tail sticking out or running around campus in sweats, although there is nothing wrong with that, of course.

But she does not seem to value her beauty beyond what is healthy. I have noticed that beautiful people who are vain about their appearance tend to associate with other beautiful, equally vain people.

But it is not that way with Victoria. At breakfast and lunch, she is never alone at a table. There are always friends with her, friends of all shapes and sizes, some pretty or handsome, some plain. She does not seem to choose her friends based on something as trivial as appearance.

Of course, that makes Victoria all the more attractive.

And I find that I am also attracted to her, for reasons that are purely platonic, almost paternal.

If I am honest, there is a selfish reason, too. Since my arrival, I’ve had every meal alone. Often, I’ve thought it would be nice to have someone to talk to as I had my meal. I could use the company, you might say.

So I thought it would be nice if Victoria and I became friends. But I am pretty sure she doesn’t want that. For a while after our first meeting, when I would see her sitting at a table in the cafeteria, I would say hello. But I could tell in her reaction that my greeting made her uncomfortable. For whatever reason, I did not seem to fit in her otherwise eclectic circles of friends, acquaintances and companions.

She has never been outright rude; I suspect that would be impossible for her. But it just seems might greetings create an awkward pause in her life. So I don’t press it.

These days, I don’t say hello when I see her in the cafeteria or around campus. I just smile and keep going. And she seems to prefer it that way, as far as I can tell.

I have wondered why it should be that way. Maybe, I represent to her some sort of gross old man, some drooling "ancient'' whose motives are too disgusting to contemplate. Maybe my smile seems more like a leer to her.

Or maybe it’s something far more innocent.

I reflect that when I was her age, the only middle-aged people I wanted to be around were relatives and, even then, only in certain circumstances and in small doses. And in the light of that, I should not be surprised if that is Victoria’s preference, too.

I do not want to give the impression that I am treated poorly by my fellow students, though. To the contrary, I am always being greeted warmly by the young students with whom I share a class. I dare say that I am the one student that everyone in class recognizes, primarily because I am conspicuous in my appearance, a gray head in a sea of blondes and brunettes.

But when I see one of my fellow students in the cafeteria, I do not invite myself to join them at their table. What’s true of Victoria is probably true of them as well, I figure. Better to wait for an invitation, I figure.

Someday, of course, Victoria will find nothing awkward or unseemly about having a friend who is many years her senior. I know that to be true, because it is consistent with my own experience. As she gets older, she will find that her circle will include those who are very much her senior. Some may even become her dearest friends. I certainly have found that to be ture.

But she isn’t there yet. And it is probably very natural that she isn’t.

So most days, I eat my meals in solitude as Victoria and her friends laugh and eat just a few tables away.

Being the “ham’’ that I am, I’d like to be in the middle of that. But I can’t force my way in, obviously.

Besides, eating meals alone hardly qualifies as a tragic circumstance. It does not crush my spirits or darken my countenance.

But just once before I graduate, I would like to sit at a table and, between bites, ask someone sitting across from me:

“So how was class today?’’