The Goldman State
Ed Goldman is a longtime newspaper and magazine columnist, the author of five books and creator of The Goldman State, a three-times-a-week online column with subscribers in 40 states, Canada and Europe. A professional playwright, composer and painter, Ed has also taught journalism at five California Universities and community colleges. His bucket list includes becoming the victim of a corporate takeover. This podcast is an extension of his unique take on the world around us and his interpretation, with all the creativity imaginable, of what that would literally sound like if he were to speak it.
The Goldman State
Episode 75: CBS Says It's Now Officially OK to Dine By Ourselves.
Please text me what you think of this episode. I would love to hear from you.
Once, I found myself at a bustling restaurant, deeply engaged in conversation—not with a dining companion, but with...Me! It turns out, I’m not alone in this solitary pursuit. I have some observations on this not so new phenomenon and an order, if you would, please.
Be sure to subscribe to my thrice weekly column, The Goldman State, by visiting the WEBSITE HERE. Thanks for listening.
00:12 - Ed Goldman (Host)
Hi, this is Ed Goldman with the Goldman State Podcast. I usually prefer dining with someone else rather than alone, provided I like the other person and extra credit, the meal begins with the other person announcing hey, this one's on me. Now, I've eaten by myself so often in my life that I rarely feel awkward, though I suppose if I were at a holiday ball and was the only one at a table set for eight, I might decide to spend the evening at the bar in another part of town. Now, at long last, I'm not alone in not minding alone.
00:48
New data indicate that more people are taking themselves out and liking it. Maybe the way I just phrased that sounds semi-creepy In my defense. What about the people who respond to a story? Someone tells about an incident that happened 10 or 15 years ago. By teasing, you're dating yourself. Well, yes, and we get along great. To be clear, taking yourself to dinner doesn't mean you're dating yourself, not even if you toss in cocktails before and a movie afterward. If you then take yourself home and wonder if you'll get up the nerve to kiss yourself goodnight, well then, it might be time to do a seance with Dr Ruth Quote.
01:24
In the US, solo dining reservations have risen 29% over the last two years, according to Open Table, the restaurant reservation site. Unquote. Cbs TV's Money Watch reports Quote they're up 18% this year in Germany and 14% in the United Kingdom. That usual suspect, the pandemic, is being credited or blamed for the rise in solo supping. But you can't just run stories like this without quoting someone from academia. Now can you? Of course not? Covid, quote.
01:55
Made social interactions less feasible and therefore less important while eating out, said Anna Matilla, a professor of lodging management at Penn State University who has studied solo dining and smartphones help some restaurant patrons feel connected to others even when they're by themselves. She said, if you're either engaged in bashful breakfasting, lonesome lunching and deserted dining, it can include your yammering on the phone. If you're using your phone to catch up on the news, your investments or a non-interactive podcast, that seems legit. For example, my own podcast is neither interactive nor proactive. It's reactive, but even using a variant of active to describe it seems deceptive. Like everything else I do to make my meager living, writing and recording, the podcast mostly involves my sitting down, which I'm doing right now. So I suppose you could call it non-active, but that would imply inactive, which would imply dormant. On my next podcast, the Liveliness of Language, we'll parse and diagram sentences in real time. Don't worry, I'm really not going to do that.
03:01
To return to the table, do you put any significance in the fact that an increasing number of Americans are eating alone compared to Germans and Brits? And why don't? We have stats on the French, sudanese, samoans and Nepalese? Theories abound. I'm sure Europeans are very sociable people, so that takes care of why Germans, brits and French diners like to have someone across the table from them, Whereas Sudanese, samoan and Nepalese people speak complicated languages. So maybe they just figure their being able to speak it is enough of an accomplishment. Why force others to talk to them?
03:34
Now, I almost always take a book or a writing tablet when I eat alone in public. The book needs to be a little dog-eared to indicate I often read and eat alone, and the writing tablet should have a few pages of cursive on them to suggest that I also write and eat alone frequently. Both of these notions probably make it sound as though I'm self-conscious when I dine alone, but no more than people who show up with memorized questions and anecdotes to share, fearing if they don't, the meal will be a disaster. My mom had the solution to this no matter where you were, whom you were with and what you'd ordered, she could always talk about other meals she'd had with other people in other venues. She even did this when I cooked for her, and now that I think of it, this may go a long way to explaining why I never mind taking myself alone to dinner. Check, I'm Ed Goldman. My column, the Goldman State, comes out every Monday, wednesday and Friday. You can subscribe for free at GoldmanStatecom. Thanks for listening.