She’s really 21? Give me a drink

HERE WE ARE AT SOME overpriced Pasadena saloon, celebrating the older daughter’s 21st birthday. That’s right, 21. Blackjack.

“My first drink,” she says giddily to her mother.

Yeah, right. Your first drink? As my buddy Irv says: Why don’t you pull my other leg for a while?

“Grandma, what’s in a martini?” the older daughter asks.

She’s seeking martini advice from my mother-in-law, in from Florida for this birthday milestone. It’s like asking Mozart about concertos. Jim Murray about metaphors.

“Gin and vermouth,” Grandma explains.

“Yum,” the older daughter says.

“Yum,” says her little sister.

I study the big menu. It looks like a tax form. I’m no fan of restaurant menus with too many choices. Ideally, there should be one obvious choice, and the other choices should be things like kitty litter, walnut shells and yesterday’s gum. That way I can order that one good thing with the knowledge that I have made the right decision.

Because inevitably in a restaurant, I order something, then have diner’s remorse. If I order pasta, I suddenly crave steak. If I order shrimp, I immediately want lamb.

“Grandma, what’s vermouth?” the older daughter asks.

My older daughter is sitting at the other end of the table, with a drink that is the color of atomically active dish soap. It is some exotic island drink that no doubt tastes like a piece of coconut pie. There is an umbrella in it. I guess in case it rains.

She hails from a family of accomplished drinkers. Irish clear up to our eyeballs, we take to alcohol the way some families take to golf or politics. When we cry, there is whiskey in our tears.

Indeed, tomorrow I will explain to her all the misery that too much of a good thing can bring to a life. The fractured relationships. The physical and emotional toll. Then again, by tomorrow this little rum drink she is swilling may explain it all.

“And, sir, what would you like?” the waitress asks.

“How’s the salmon?” I say.

The waitress is way too skinny to trust with such an important question. Probably had a spoon of low-fat yogurt and three deep breaths for lunch. Nothing more. She can’t even sound enthusiastic when I ask her about the linguini.

In L.A., all the waitresses are too skinny. You can ask them about a soliloquy in “Hamlet.” Or to recite dialogue from the final episode of “Friends.” But never ask an L.A. waitress about food. From all appearances, they’ve never had any.

Instead, send out the chef. Let him waddle to the table, belch a couple of times, then describe what he’ll eat when his shift is over. I prefer my dining advice from someone who daydreams about gravy, just like I do.

“I’ll have the cod,” I finally say, and immediately crave a good burger.

It is loud here in this Pasadena restaurant. Louder than a hundred babies. Classic rock screams from the speakers. Rod Stewart is hollering about how Maggie May is starting to show her age. It’s a nice setting for an important meal. Like having dinner on a tarmac behind a jet bound for Singapore.

“Maggie, I wish I’d never seen your face!” Rod Stewart screams.

“AY! AY! AY! AY! AY!” the baby wails.

“AY! AY! AY! AY! AY!” I answer.

“AY! AY! AY! AY AY!” he wails again while banging his fists on the table.

“More bread?” I ask him, handing him a dinner roll.

“Why not,” the baby says.

To my right, he sits. The baby’s bare feet are like plump August tomatoes. They are soft and smooth and appear never to have touched the Earth. It is as if we keep him in a moist terrarium under a warm and constant light.

At the other end of the parenting spectrum sits my older daughter -- freshly 21, sisters with the sun.

She is home from college for the summer with that leaky new puppy and that boyfriend with the guitar. With her back, the house is full again. Her laugh could warm Canada and significant parts of North Dakota. When she smiles, which is often tonight, her freckled nose crinkles and this dark restaurant seems to brighten.

I point this fact out to her mother, someone who appreciates the value of good lighting.

“She has nice white teeth,” her mother explains.

“The best.”

“That orthodontist did a really nice job,” she adds.

He’s not the only one. Blackjack, baby.

Chris Erskine can be reached at chris.erskine@latimes.com.