Life is short.

I used to believe that trying new things is the point of life. After all, if we don’t keep trying, how will we know what we like or don’t like? How will we discover the undiscovered parts of ourselves?

Before, I never understood how people went to their regular restaurant for the same thing. How did people come into the same restaurant and look at Sally and ask, “I’ll get the usual.” Then Sally would say, “Great!” and she would wink, smile, and set the plate down the way people want it. Perhaps with the same extra sauce. Then a drink made with the same amount of ice. Just one, no more than that.

I rarely went to the same place more than twice a year (unless demanded by my peers). Every day, it was something new. Something different.

Yet, after disappointments and missed expectations, I have the usual. For restaurants, to start. I am afraid of trying the new hipster restaurants on Valencia because I would scan the menu in disappointment not being able to find a single item that I really want and end up with something that seemed ok. But then I’ll have a bite and know that I’ll dislike it. So then should I send it back unsure if it’s really for me?

So instead, I say…nah, let’s go the usual. Let’s have the rotisserie chicken in the way I like it. With yuca fries and vegetales saltados. I would eat it in the restaurant with my fingers and I would lick each finger one by one. That is my usual.