dear diary, the couple in front of the taps needs an old fashioned and a light beer but i'm knee-deep in stirring a martini, feet stationed firmly on swiss-cheese rubber mat as i twist my upper body all robotic to grab gin, pour onetwothreefourfivesix, bottle clatters back into the well but i have already moved on to vermouth—just a whisper, tip the bottle barely enough to splash the glass, whirl it around, throw it out—and the vibraphone on the stereo chimes above the chatter while i clink the julep strainer into my mixing glass, glugglugglug the gin into a frosted coupe, call out GIN MARTINI READY AT THE BAR and grab my next set of glasses, this time two low tumblers for a margarita and a negroni—on the rocks, please, the elderly gentleman had insisted—campari and more gin and this time sweet vermouth each suspend themselves in the air between the mouth of a speed pourer and the bottom of the mixing glass, tequila into the tank of a boston shaker then ice then seal then shake with my left hand, stir with my right, julep again then wind up wrist to crack the shaker open for the audience that slowly trickles in through the front door, unaware that each minute they glue their ass to one of these stools in front of me is another minute i can empty my mind of everything but fine dining and breathing, another minute without a racing thought besides did i give that girl that water she asked for or i wonder when these people will leave—a full night of being so connected to a wooden bartop and every sordid secret spilled across it, i forget i'm here (as in, on earth) at all.