The first time I ever I went to Olive Garden, it was my 18th birthday. My friend Griffin had found out I hadn’t ever been there, and he thought it was “barbaric”.
So we went.
I feel it’s necessary to make the distinction that this wasn’t a date, and neither of us had any interest in the other romantically.
We were simply teammates/co-workers/friends that liked doing things together. Especially if it involved food and a movie.
We respected each other, and the dynamic between us was similar to that of two minimum-wage employees working in a high-stress job and just trying to get through high school.
(Go figure!)
He even tried to set me up with his best friend. I take that as a high compliment, coming from him.
I am older than Griffin, by about two years, and I have always felt this gap in years — and maturity. He’d be the one that caused trouble, I’d be the voice of reason, and sometimes the one that cleaned up afterwards.
So needless to say, I was more than eager to be introduced to this restaurant by the class clown in my friend group. I knew I would be in for a wild ride.
The movie we decided to see was the summer’s action/thriller Nerve. I wasn’t a huge fan of the actors or the trailer, but I knew I would enjoy seeing it with Griffin.
After the movie was finished — which we both enjoyed very much — we went right across the street to the Olive Garden.
The Clackamas Town Center in Oregon is in the perfect spot for a lot of different things — there’s a MAX station next to it, another strip mall right across from it, and various restaurants nearby.
And a Target. (I’ll get back to that.)
The restaurant itself was smaller inside than I thought it would be, but it was well-lit and clean.
I think I should give a little background about the Olive Garden culture within my family:
My parents adore Olive Garden. Practically every date night is spent there, and if me or my siblings are at a loss for a gift idea for one of them, we know an Olive Garden giftcard will be welcomed.
I had no idea what the draw was for them, as the leftovers they brought home were never as good as they looked.
Except the breadsticks. The breadsticks were always gone by the following day. Without fail.
We walked in the door, and were greeted by the concierge at the entrance as she asked if we wanted a table for two.
Griffin was obviously pleased to be the experienced one in this situation, and he was acting very confident as he said we wanted a booth.
We didn’t have to wait at all for a table, and got led to one right away. I got immediately distracted by the geometric designs on the lamp overhead, and how the light got refracted on the table.
We looked at each other, and exchanged the glances of two children masquerading as grown-ups, in a fancy restaurant for the first time.
I ordered the food most familiar to me, the Chicken Fettuccine Alfredo. I knew that if I didn’t like it, it would be because they had made it wrong.
(Chicken alfredo has always been one of my favorites of my mom’s dishes, and I felt very experienced in my knowledge of how it should taste.)
Before the alfredo arrived, we demolished the salad and croutons and breadsticks they served us.
Completely demolished. As in, we had no salad left by the time the pasta arrived, and we were still hungry.
The alfredo was good, and I began to be suspicious as to where my mom had perfected her recipe.
After we finished the alfredo, we started to try and figure out what we wanted for dessert.
By then, I could almost physically feel my wallet groaning in pain, so I suggested we split the dessert. I never even considered the fact that that might be considered flirting.
(Fortunately, I don’t think he did, either.)
The chocolate mousse was amazing, and soon we were trying to figure out how to pay the check — separately — with the fancy electronic table thingy.
We finally triumphed, and left the restaurant full, and full of energy.
“Wanna walk around the Target?” Griffin asked, and I didn’t even have to consider before saying “yeah!”
We walked across the parking lot, and proceeded to spend the fuzzy hours-right-before-midnight in Target, sniffing all the scented candles.
ALL of them.
There were three shelves of them, and all the ones that could be opened we opened.
(I discovered that the scents that smell the most fake are the ones like “Wild Orchid”, or “Pomegranate Passion”. And “Fresh Linen”? That’s your basic laundry detergent. Aisle 14.)
We sauntered around Target, making fun of the latest tween trends in entertainment and fashion; just how do you even put on a shirt with that many straps?!
We looked at all the latest toys and movies, judged the card aisle for the bad jokes and the dollar grab-boxes for the cheapness of products.
I found one thing I wanted to buy, a black metal jewelry tree with a squirrel. And a bird. And a leaf.
(I had to get it!)
Griffin found his weakness as we neared the registers: random card packs for Magic: The Gathering.
(He tried to teach me how to play it once, but I got distracted by the art on the cards, and I don’t remember even one rule he taught me.)
As we walked out, I teased him for giving in to the thing that would probably make him broke — again.
We hung out on his pickup truck until my older sister came to take me home (I didn’t have a car yet), and talked about everything under the sun — or rather, the moon.
It wasn’t until years later that I realized that that birthday outing could have counted as a date, and it made me wonder if the thought had ever crossed his mind.
It made me mildly uncomfortable to realize that I might have unintentionally led on a friend, even just once, in a perfectly platonic situation.
But “chill” doesn’t always have to mean a relationship.
My kind of chill is spending time with someone I’m comfortable with, and whether that means that we end up spending more time together with a different intention, so be it.
(But that hasn’t happened yet, and I may be a little oblivious sometimes, but I think I’m doing just fine, thank you.)
Since that birthday dinner, I haven’t been back to Olive Garden. Not that I didn’t like it, I just prefer Panda Express, or Taco Bell.
Target, on the other hand, I’ve been to many times since then, and many of them at night. Stores like Target at night strike me as those in-between sort of places, with one foot in the real world and one foot in a immaterial sort of existence.
But that’s a story for another time.
