There Will Be Brunch

We had the whole "milkshake" thing ruined for us.

It's our own fault, really, waiting so long to see the film everyone was raving about. In a society that latches quickly as it can to catch phrases once the old ones start fraying at the edges, it's no surprise that you hear "I drink your milkshake!" around every corner. We didn't know over the course of two-and-a-half hours of oil-slicked celluloid when the famous line would be spat, but we spent the entire time waiting for it.

Say no more. We've been down this road before. I refuse to be a spoiler.

Instead I could tell you about brunch the day before, about slipping the Bioy Casares book and a camera into my tailor-made bag and heading to Chelsea for coffee, mimosas, pork sandwiches.

This brunch thing! I've lived here for eight years, and yet still brunch seems like an illusion, something you do when you're pretending to live in New York, pretending to be adults, pretending to be awake at noon. And all of New York is there with you, pretending, laughing at the right moment, dropping a fork, leaning in with the check and opening the door to let the winter draft in. A whole city conspiring in some grand illusion.

So we brunched, we laughed. We talked about books and music and life and love. And then, later, spontaneous store-hopping (always shop in groups of three — to prevent accidental fashion-victimicide), when I became detached from reality.

My mother and I both suffer from a particular type of migraine — not the kind that keeps women like Joan Didion locked in a dark room with a washcloth pressed to their foreheads in fear of loud noises, but rather one that causes a person to suddenly see the world as if you are detached from it. A form of temporary blindness, often brought on by a unique combination of bright lights, caffeine, and the overstimulating atmosphere of clothing stores, grocery stores, restaurants. I stand there, in the spice aisle, trying to locate something as simple as cinnamon, and suddenly everything around me seems hollow, miles away, like I've entered my own dreams. Whatever it is that keeps my grip on reality is suddenly yanked out from under me.

I put out my arms as if to steady myself. I warn my companions: "I have one of my migraines coming on." They feign a reach for a washcloth.

These magical headaches my mother and I are cursed with, blessed with, taking us outside of reality. Showing us what an illusion it is to exist here in this body, on this earth. Shopping for these clothes. Eating this brunch with these women. Drinking your milkshake.

The illusion of life.

For those of you who might read Adolfo Bioy Casares's The Invention of Morel one day, it would be slightly cruel of me to tell you what this has to do with anything, but it does. It has to do with a lot. And at one point today in the cinema, before we even got to the line about drinking milkshakes, when hundreds of New York eyes were transfixed on Daniel Day Lewis leaning over a campfire, I followed the glow of the fire up through a shaft of light to its source, to the little window above our heads, and rather than ruining the illusion, seeing where the light came from made it all the more magical.

As if the simple of act of realizing what a grand illusion life is makes the whole thing all the more grand.

© Zan McQuade. All rights reserved.