A Place at the Table; or Just a Crumb, Please

They’re talking in tongues again.

I have been in this meeting for 30 minutes and have managed to absorb only two things:  One, many of us have not had enough coffee for such goings-on; and Two, I’m not as bright as I think I am.

The first one I knew.

The second one?  Well, frankly, I’m shocked.

I sit at my desk afterwards, trying to take in this latest discovery.  I mean, look at me, with the straight spine, with the eyeglasses and the mostly-straight teeth!  Do I not look intelligent to you?

Have I been fooling myself all these years?

“You look,” she says, “bewildered.”

I look up at my boss, try to wipe the bewilderment from my face. “Do I?”

“You okay?”

I consider this.  Am I okay? 

I decide that I am not. 

“Can I help?” she says. 

I consider this.  “Sometimes,” I say, “I work side jobs, serving at banquets.  One of the places I work, the clientele is overwhelmingly Lebanese and they speak a multitude of different languages there.  So one day, a good hour or more after dinner service, a new man joins one of the tables.  Another man at the table waves me over – a very handsome man! – and asks me if I can round up a plate of food for the newcomer.  I tell him I’ll do what I can, but that the kitchen is already closing.  “Oh, well,” the handsome man says to me, ”Do you speak Arabic?”  I tell him, "La'a.  Ana a’asef’, which is, of course, Arabic for ‘no, I’m sorry’.”

Stacy gives me a look.  I shrug. 

I can also ask for the ashtray in Russian, but I don’t like to brag.

“Anyway,” I say, “the handsome man says a phrase in Arabic and then looks at me expectantly.  I’ve exhausted my Arabic, however, in that one little phrase.  ‘Can you say this?’ he says, and he repeats himself.  I can’t, though.  I can’t even hear it properly.  It’s as if there’s nothing for me to hold on to, no starting point.

"I had laughed politely, in that Minnesota way.  I mean, he can repeat it as he likes, but I cannot repeat the string of words he’s just said.

“It’s a saying,” he smiles.  “I said, ‘He can sit at the table, but he will not receive a plate’”.

Stacy continues to stare at me.

“I’m sitting at the table,” I say to her, “but I feel as if I might not get a plate.”

“Plus,” she says, “it sounds like we’re speaking Arabic.”

I nod.

They’re talking in a language for which I have no reference point.