There was a New York news story reported by the AP in the local rag, the Fort Myers News-Press, along with a photo. I scanned it for familiar buildings, longing for a connection. I am transplanted to Florida by an evil magician who said, “You can be warm but your brain will turn to porridge while you seek intellectual companionship.”

I remembered that Le Copain, the elegant restaurant featured in “The French Connection” was only a block away on the corner of 50th St. and First Avenue. “I’ll look it up,” I said to Ed, since I have a Manhattan phone book sent to me by a sympathetic New York friend. “It won’t be there,” said my spouse, and he was right. Oh, oh, oh.

So I looked up Le Cygne, Le Cirque, The Sign of the Dove, The Gold Coin (not in their league but still nice), Clos Normand, Firenze, Top of the Sixes (a pricey bar and snackery in the 666 Fifth Avenue building) and La Veranda, a mid-price but elegant little eatery in the Elysee Hotel -- all gone. “Hey,” I said, “I’m an anachronism.”

But Flower Drum and The Four Seasons are still there, I reported to Ed, a tear running down one cheek. And there was a restaurant on First Avenue close by the UN that was staffed by imported Chinese chefs and the food was incredible, but I can’t remember its name.

In case anyone’s wondering, I never paid for a meal at any of these places. I was always on the tag-end of someone’s expense account, not important enough to have one of my own but enough up in the hierarchy to be part of the assemblage.

Here’s a little anecdote during a meal at La Veranda. I was with a friend and his friend. The three of us were having dinner to commemorate a special occasion. Bill S., whom I had grown to know and more or less be wary of, had been on the wagon for a number of months and thought he had successfully beaten back the demons of alcoholism. As a reward to himself, now that he was master, he was going to allow himself to drink again, moderately of course. The waiter came. Bill made intense eye contact with him. “I want a martini,” he intoned, almost in a trance. His voice was serious, level, no mistaking its gravity. “It has to be very cold,” he went on. “I want an olive, are you listening?” He was talking himself into a rage at the prospect of possibly getting a martini that would not be perfect enough to inaugurate his return to a meaningfuul (in his case, an unconscious) life. Nothing about it was to be disappointing. Inwardly, I quaked.

The drinks came, Bill was not happy but he drank. And drank. We poured ourselves out into the street and got into a cab. It wound its way down Lexington Avenue. Bill had to throw up. He opened the door on his side, with the cab doing about 40 mph, and started to heave. The driver had a fit, stopped and threw us all out. I was grateful to be alive and walking. I didn’t see much of Bill after that.

xx, Teal