The best travel stories usually begin with failure. This is inconvenient. We spend enormous amounts of time trying to prevent exactly this. Reservations. Confirmations. Backups. Insurance. Weather apps. Maps. Schedules. Then years later, nobody tells the story about the trip where every reservation worked. We remember the disaster. The storm. The missed flight. The hotel [...]
We know too much about each other. This is a strange problem. For most of history, if you met an attractive stranger, you had questions. Where does he live? What does he do? Who are his friends? What does he like? Where has he traveled? What kind of person is he? Now, depending on the [...]
I am a terrible eavesdropper. Not maliciously. Curiously. There is a difference. Probably. Restaurants are full of fragments. A sentence from the next table. A look between two people. A hand gesture. A silence. And suddenly I have invented an entire biography. Are they married? Having an affair? Closing a deal? Breaking up? Celebrating something? [...]
Room service is one of civilization's finest ideas. I realize this may not rank alongside antibiotics or electricity in historical importance. Still. Food arriving at your door while you are wearing a robe feels like progress. I love the entire ritual. The knock. The cart. The little silver domes. The tiny vase with one flower [...]
Funny men are dangerous. Not criminally. Usually. I mean romantically. A handsome man can get your attention. A funny man can get past your defenses. This is worse. You are prepared for handsome. You see him coming. You register the suit, the jawline, the smile. Fine. Your brain files the information. Then someone makes you [...]
People love saying money doesn't buy happiness. Usually in extremely comfortable rooms. The statement is both true and misleading. Money does not guarantee happiness. Obviously. We have all seen miserable rich people. Some of them are very committed to the craft. But money absolutely buys things that make life easier. And ease matters. It buys [...]
I think dinner deserves better clothes. Not every dinner. I am not wearing silk to eat soup alone over the sink. We remain practical. But when dinner is an event, I want it to look like one. There is something deeply satisfying about dressing for evening. Daytime belongs to function. Shoes you can walk in. [...]
I have no intention of becoming sensible. Responsible, yes. Sensible, not entirely. There is a difference. Responsible means you pay attention to consequences. Sensible means you stop doing things that might become stories. I would prefer to keep the stories. Aging has a strange reputation. We talk about becoming wiser. More measured. More careful. Less [...]
I love restaurants. Beautiful ones, tiny ones, famous ones, slightly chaotic ones, hotel restaurants, neighborhood places, old institutions with polished silver, new places where nobody can explain the menu without using the word "concept." I love the theater of them. The entrance. The host stand. The first drink. The menus. The tiny decisions that somehow [...]
Airports make me strangely emotional. Not airport security. There is very little poetry in removing one's shoes beside a plastic bin. I mean airports as places. They contain an extraordinary amount of human feeling for buildings designed primarily around moving luggage. Every few feet, someone is leaving someone. Or coming back. A family is standing [...]