Olive Kitteridge and the Hunger

I am three-fourths the way through Olive Kitteridge, a novel by Elizabeth Strout. The problem with reading Olive is that you start moving through your life the way the narrator does.  Olive's presence floats into your mind and you start seeing all the people around you and their hunger for living.  Then I start narrating my life in the same way:

"Melonie looked across the table at her husband.  He was just as handsome, despite being older.  She noticed he had shaved his beard close.  She liked that and commented on it.  He raised his eyebrow at her.  "You like that, huh?"  Perhaps he was attempting to flirt.  
They sat at the corner window table at La Jolla Groves restaurant, their 35th minute into waiting for their dinner.  The conversation had lagged. The long table next to them was filled with children, a set of grandparents, and what must have been their three grown children.  The couple nearest them had a crying baby which was passed from person to person in an attempt to quiet her. Their two-year old son is crawling all over laps and chairs. Melonie wanted to be irritated and give them a dirty look, but she couldn't.  The fact was, she liked the sound, and a hunger to hold the baby tore at her heart for a few moments.


'Have we turned into the couple we always used to make fun of?' she asked D'Artagnan.  
"What do you mean?'
"You know, the kind that sits in restaurants and never say a word to each other.  The kind that looks everywhere but at their spouse?"
He laughs.  "No! I was just going to say I saw a couple outside dancing over there by the fire. They're gone now."  and in that small moment, his voice betrays that he wishes it had been him. 
"Where?"  Melonie looks out at the outdoor mall decorated with leftover blue and white Christmas lights.  "Why didn't you tell me?"
"You seemed busy looking at other things."  She nods in agreement and then like a dam that breaks, D'Artagnan's voice spills over her, telling her of his week and his worries.  She is grateful for the deluge.  Their food finally arrives and the snippy Irish waiter drops it without apology in front of her.  For a split second, Melonie sees his disdain.  He wants to be snowboarding, or with his girlfriend, or watching football - anything but serving this middle-age woman pasta. The tortellini looks like the something she would make at home with canned Ragu.  Why is she paying fourteen dollars for something she would make at home?


"Excuse me? Where are the mixed vegetables?"
"They're in the sauce."
"Where?"
"Those little green things," he says and walks away.
D'Artagnan and Melonie exchange a look born of nineteen years of them going to bad restaurants that she had insisted they go to for the experience of "trying something new." This one she had begged him to go to because it had fake lemon trees for a ceiling that you can sit under and pretend you are in California. He had groaned and agreed.

Now they laugh at the rudeness of the waiter.  The baby next to them cries.
The young mother leans over and apologizes for the noise.  Melonie sees the tiredness in her eyes and that she is on the verge of tears.  She understands that the woman has come to please her in-laws, but she just wants to go home and put the blanket over her head--perhaps not come out for days. Melonie tells her that she has nothing to apologize for, they miss the sound.  Their youngest is now five.  D'Artagnan compliments the woman on having beautiful children.  The woman seems relieved. 


They leave a few minutes later, D'Artagnan helping Melonie put on her black wool peacoat.  His perfect hand resting on her shoulder for a fleeting second as he guides her through the lemon-colored tablecloths and under the plastic lemon groves.  Olive Kitteridge, settling her bulky body into the chair, nods to them as they walk out the large swinging doors.