particulars

It was when I first moved to Boston, at the beginning of my game of 'big city' that I was meeting up with an old friend at a new bar in a happening place of the city. It was cool, it was hip. The bar had a great logo and a cool interior. Though I could relay nearly any aspect of that night of new beginnings, it was the beer glasses that took my interest the most. Typically, I order a beer, and shortly after am holding either a thick, tall glass, or a stein. These two shapes seem to encompass 90% of the beer that I have taken in at bars across the world. However, this bar had squat, super thin glasses that I noticed immediately and loved. There was a fragility about them that seemed out of place, but strangely turned the glass from industrial(thick) to intimate, by simply being faced with the reality of fragility. It sounds ridiculous, but I've always had them in my mind when I was in a place selling stemware. In putting together my apartment, I had high aspirations by simply setting foot in my local cb2. $1800 sofas, $80 picture frames, and $100 shower curtains were all out my league. But tucked toward the back of the store were a series of glasses, and after inspection, and a slight catch of my breath, there they were. for $2.50 each. I grabbed two off the shelf, despite my apartment's simultaneous lack of shelf space and lack of need for more glasses. I headed to the checkout, stupidly elated with my find, and one of the employees waved me over to his booth. "Oh, these are my favorite glasses" he said. "I buy these all the time, because they break so often." We made small talk about one time he poured cold whiskey into one and it "just shattered out of nowhere". We made small talk about how we had the first same name. We made small talk about the day, the upcoming weekend, and a myriad of other things that made me believe that I had just met my new best friend. Cut to 2 months later when I was back in cb2, after one of those glasses had broken. I again went to the back of the store, again grabbed 2 more glasses, and again went to the checkout. My friend Brian didn't seem to be there. I waited patiently as the woman in front of me was finishing up, when my bff Brian swooped in and asked if I was ready to check out. After walking over to the exact same register and setting the same two glasses down, he proceeded to have the nearly identical series of comments as he had the first time. Before I knew it, he launched into his whiskey story, the breaking of multiple glasses, our name similarity, where my area code was from. It took me off guard. My insides were screaming "Don't you remember me?!" I was completely different in my mannerisms, not completely believing that this was all happening again. And I didn't really know how to feel. The first time, this guy seemed strangely warm and kind. He had funny, interesting things to say and I felt some sort of retail connection. The second time, it felt so cheap and fake. Is that how you make it? Put on the facade 20 times a day in order to come across as genuine? What the fuck?