IT PAYS TO BE EYE-TALIAN

Many years ago, as I interviewed for my first job in New York City, I went to a great little agency located high above mid-town Manhattan. I sat in a waiting room sided by a couch on one side and the opposite side was three bank elevators.

As I waited with my large college portfolio nervously looking at the receptionist to tell me to go in, this gentleman (Jack) entered wearing an ascot. He introduced himself to me as the man I would interview with and sit down next to me on the couch. He hired me on the spot and I was to report the following Monday.

It blew me away as the first day of my career began. This time I passed the door that Jack had come out of into the heart of the agency proper. One-man offices lined the outer walls with beautiful views of the NYC skyline. This is what I dreamt of it being like. My heart was racing and now I was wondering if I belonged there?

We turned a secretary pool and I was escorted into the corner office. In here was my desk and drawing table, in a corner surrounded on two sides with large windows! The view was awesome and I was awestruck!

After I met everyone including the owner of the agency, it was time for lunch. And so off we went to a restaurant called Iperbole, and as we sat the waiter took our order, Jack doing the honors. He ordered lobsters for both of us, asking if I ever had lobster. This, of course, was a trick question, after all, I was born to eat lobster.

Jack was German in ancestry, eating with an Eye-talian American born in Brooklyn NY of late from the outback of Long Island. "Wow!" I thought to myself, here was a really cool art director, NYC type, with a tie on today, taking me to lunch and we're eating lobsters! How cool is this and what the Hell am I doing here?

When the lunch was done, my lobster carcass was picked clean, only shells remained, Jack looks like his lobster was in a car accident, or broken like something was hidden inside it and Jack was picking about.

The waiter came over to our table and to clear the dishes away, took my plate and smiled and then took Jack's plate and frowned, looking Jack in the eye telling him he should learn from the young signor on how to properly eat lobsters.

This was my introduction to life in the big agency, as an Eye-talian, doing what I do best: eating lobsters! I was surprised he didn't send me packing that day but instead laughed it off!