Finding Love in a Beanman

My life clearly revolves around food. Twelve years ago I met my husband in a Mexican restaurant. He managed the place; I was dating the cook. Frijolero's shut down probably 10 years ago now, but people around town still speak fondly of it. Staffed completely by artists and musicians, most of them surly to the customers, and all of them crazy good looking, it was an extremely popular place to hang out. Bands played there a few nights a week, and the restaurant shared an alley with three bars, so there was always an interesting crowd of people filing in and out. I spent entirely too much time there. If you consider that the restaurant occupied the former spot of A&A Bakery, a place my mother and I frequented during my childhood, then the story becomes even more ridiculous.

The Carnivore and I didn't get to know each other too well during that time, but we ran into each other over the years following the demise of Frijolero's, at parties, at shows, here and there around town. We would say hello and go about our business. I saw his band play a few times at the 40 Watt and I remember idly thinking that I might be interested. But never enough so that I felt inclined to act on it.

Eight years ago I saw him at a V-Roys show at the Georgia Theater and I gave him a hug. We still laugh about that hug. The fateful one that spawned a romance we never expected.

Our first date was Thanksgiving weekend 1997. The relationship started slow and went nowhere fast. The picture above was taken on Thanksgiving Day the following year. We were finally admitting we really cared about each other, though we never would have copped to falling in love. That took yet another year together.

Truly, we were made for each other. Early in the relationship we spent a long lazy Sunday together. We drank coffee and read the newspaper cover to cover, strewing sections from one end of the living room to the other. We didn't talk much, except to read something aloud to the other, or to discuss where our next meal might come from. I remember thinking I might have met my dream man.

The following summer The Carnivore housesat for a friend of his, and we spent most of our free time on the back for two weeks, reading, discussing politics or music, eating. The Carnivore played his guitar a lot, and I wrote in my notebook. He claims that is when he began to think we really had a future.

We are fairly solitary people. We like being together, but we'd be perfectly happy to spend day after day out here in the country, cooking and reading and spending time with Odd Toddler, but alone from anybody else. Its not that we are completely antisocial, just that we enjoy our peace and quiet.

We spent our honeymoon in a beach house on Folly Island. We went out to eat every night, and we hit nearly every thrift store in Charleston in one single day, but for the most part we spent our time sitting on the second floor porch, with a stack of books and newspapers by our side. The tourist season was over, and we had the beach mostly to ourselves. Just the way we like it.

On Friday we will celebrate our fifth wedding anniversary. Since we will be out of town on our anniversary, we went out to eat together a few days ago at the most obvious place we could think of. A Mexican restaurant of course.