PlatterPuss
I’m not certain, but I think one of my neighbors just zinged me. This was from a French woman who lives nearby on our hilltop. From what I can piece together, she and her French husband own and operate a successful online translation company with a catchy name that is a contraction of their French last name. That means she is probably pretty literate and meant exactly what she said in her note to us. You see, we are doing this neighborhood open-house gathering for the people who live on this hilltop. I have the email list and the phone list of perhaps all but a handful of new residents, but the bounce-backs from several others made me think that it would be a good idea to belt and suspenders the invitations. Kim started by sending out an email to everyone she had emails for. I then went around and collected several more emails by knocking on doors. Even then, the RSVP (Hey! That’s French isn’t it?) list was lighter than it should have been. So Kim and I made some calls on the excuse that some emails get old or get less used as a place where junk mail sits unnoticed. That yielded a few added responses, but for some we had just gone from junk email into junk voice mail.
That is when I decided that we also needed to print up a flyer with the contents of Kim’s original email, adding two visuals in the form of a picture of our departing neighbor, Mary (the personal touch) and a plat map of the neighborhood with people’s names on it where they were known. That map would certainly draw in the curious who are less personable and perhaps into finding economic value in the hood by better understanding who owns what and what might be available for a quick buck profit. I felt that I now had the bases covered. We had done email canvassing, telemarketing and junk mail (actually hand bills like the Chinese restaurants and start-up tree services stuff into our mail boxes). The mailbox stuff happened on the Sunday of Memorial Day, so they likely sat in that hot box for two days before being collected with the Tuesday mail. Today we are getting our reward in some nice “what can I bring?” calls from the neighbors that had ignored the email and phone solicitations, but felt the flyer was too much to overcome.
So, this French woman sent an email back to Kim (there was no email on the flyer, so she clearly got the original email) and said, “Thank you for your emails, multiple phone calls and mailbox flyer about your planned event.” I grew up in Europe and feel that I reasonably understand the French approach to Americans, and I think it is safe to say that she was telling us something like, “alright, already, we get the point, you want us all to come to your stupid house on our day off and pretend to care about saying goodbye to neighbor Mary and pretend to enjoy meeting the other people who live on this hilltop….fine, we’ll come, what can we bring?”
This gathering is set up to be a three-hour open house with Mary as the queen bee, saying her fond farewells to the folks she has lived near for the past twenty-five years (she was the first resident of the hilltop). We are throwing the shindig with an assist from Mary’s neighbors on the other side, probably the youngest couple in the neighborhood. She trains dogs and he is a park ranger. They are handy people to have nearby and they will do some valuable things for the party like bring the ice and the water (young people are big on water). As an open house, we would normally be at risk of having that awkward first half hour when no one comes early and we sit around watching the cheese and salami curl up at the edges. This time we have the benefit of fully ten family members who do not live in the hood, but are as curious as we are to meet the other folks on the hill. That means we will start with a core group and will always feel like we have a party underway. As of now, we are edging up towards another forty or so people plus anyone who just didn’t bother or didn’t speak enough French to understand RSVP. We will undoubtedly get some hand-carried guacamole, a Bundt cake or two and a few bottles of CostCo’s best vintage wine.
As for our party-planning, we fortunately have a house that works well for entertaining indoors and out and are blessed with San Diego weather that promises to be perfect with a high of 73 degrees. We will have one set-up out on the patio by the babbling brook and spa. That is a space covered by a big palapa so the shade and the table seating out there will be very enticing. We also have the kitchen and deck (wide open folding doors to bring the outside inside and vice versa), and will put another complete set-up in there. As an open house from 3-6pm people should be at worst a little hungry and thirsty. We will offer water, wine, beer, soda, lemonade and iced tea with ice and garnishes for those who want it. There will be hard liquor on the beverage area counter with Tanqueray, Cuervo and Grey Goose for afternoon drinkers and even Jack Daniels and Wild Turkey for the brave of heart, but those intrepid souls will have to make their own and risk their neighbors silent but ever-vigilant opprobrium.
For food, Kim has found a caterer that specializes in party platters. These are not your usual deli platters that serve to shovel out food for the mob. These are upscale party platters done in a decidedly Southern California style. They are less platters than grazing tables and are even called as much. There will be charcuterie grazing platters, crudités grazing platters and fruit grazing platters. It must be frustrating to the caterers that while the meat, cheese and veggies get decidedly French-sounding labels, the fruit platters are just fruit platters in French. Fruit is just fruit, but I guess you say it with a more pursed-lip sort of mannerism. These platters look fabulous. Once I saw them I immediately told Kim she needed to expand the order to put more of them (actually bigger ones of them) out so that we do not run out if the word gets out that we have having a Provençal meet and greet. Fancy platters and deli platters all look the same after they have been grazed over, so my objective is to keep them fresh and tart looking. I want to see people try to eat the sliced figs and the Drafonfruit. Personally, I can never get past the Kiwi.
This gathering promised to be very revealing to all and nobody is more in their underwear than Kim and me with our house and family all on display for everyone to go home and talk about. I trust some will also go home with pocketfuls of cheese and celery and figs. I have to go now to mark my liquor bottles and to go buy a beret to wear for the occasion.