Vancouver Vignettes, Part II: Penelope and The Top of Vancouver

For my fifteenth birthday, my Sunday School teacher asked me where she could treat me and our class ~ a gaggle of five girls known as "Class 5" ~ for dinner. (Now, I know the instant I say, "Sunday School teacher," images might spring to your head of either a soft-spoken young kindergarten-teacher-in-training, an old, grandmothery-type with her soft halo of hair in a grey bun, or worse, a crabby, disappointed-with-life woman with embittered frown lines grooved into the sides of her pursed mouth. You would be very much mistaken.)

Penelope was none of these things. One of the first female engineering students at UBC, P. was just ten years older than me and graduated at the top of her class. She went on to become, amongst many other things, Lead Programmer at Electronic Arts for some of their legendary FIFA games. Even at work, she was one of the very few women in a company mostly comprised by men. Full of sharp verve, outspokenness, and boisterous laughter, she worked tirelessly to foster in each of her students an independence of mind, individuality, and personal accountability. She travelled constantly on her own, saved up money from countless hours of work to go on volunteer missions in third world countries, bought a cute little red Honda Civic to ferry around anyone who ever needed a ride, took you out if you needed to celebrate or to cry, and invariably stood up for what she believed ~ regardless of disrupting the status quo. Needless to say, she was quite the hit with the ultra-conservative older Chinese crowd at church. While Penelope was the bane of most grown-ups, she was my ultimate mentor and heroine.

Since my parents really only ever took us to Chinese restaurants, I wanted whitey food. And since the city has always been so engrained in my psyche and I love cities at night in general, the slowly-revolving Top of Vancouver Restaurant ~ located above the observation deck at Harbour Centre, one of city's tallest landmark buildings ~ was my obvious choice. (Also, since we were in the middle of a gorgeous West Coast spring, I couldn't wait to put on a pretty dress and enjoy views of our bejewelled mountains, oceans and inlets, and cherry blossoms at sunset.)

For anyone who's never seen or heard of it, Harbour Centre is to Vancouver what the Space Needle is to Seattle and the Empire State Building is to New York. The edifice is special to most Vancouverites because it's visible almost anywhere you are in the city, is an easy destination for out-of-town guests because there's an amazing (but pricey) observation deck on the top, and is distinctively lovely at night ~ especially at Christmastime when they decorate it with fairy lights. (The building's significance to me increased a thousandfold three years later when it became the swank and sleek new downtown campus of my university ~ allowing for many a movie viewing, exploration, and cozy coffee with friends between lectures and tutorials... and, it was just a few blocks from my bookstore job so I could sprint to and from school and work.)

Thus, the seven of us (Penelope's slightly vapid-but-sweet best friend, Suzie, was also invited) excitedly made our way up the whooshingly ultra-fast elevator to the restaurant. After we were seated, I made a decision that made my palms sweat and body feel both chill and hot as I gathered the courage to ask permission. It wasn't so much that I was scared of getting in trouble; I was more afraid of losing my teacher's good opinion because I wanted to do something so absolutely illegal, but without secrecy and shame.

"Penelope," I gulped with brave trepidation. "May I order an alcoholic drink?"

The table went agog with delighted horror at my daring. I always was a source of morbid fascination with the other girls, and I never really quite fit in. P. always told me this was a very good thing. Tonight, at my query, a bright gleam appeared in her eyes and she smiled quietly. "Sweetie, order whatever you want. I know you'll do whatever's right for you."

And so, amongst the aghast looks from my class and without even a second glance from the server, I ordered a B-52 on my fifteenth birthday with the blessing of my Sunday School teacher. It tasted terrible, but I never made face; I was still reeling with the giddy joy of getting away with something no one else would even think to do, and I did it *legitimately.* (I was never much of one for sneaking around; if I was going to do something heinous or questionable, an authority figure would pretty much be informed beforehand.) There was not a lot of conversation as the other girls were still so hushed and weirded out by my desire to break the law and do something so... so bad.

A merciful distraction was made when, at one memorable point in the evening, the restaurant suddenly felt like it jerked and lurched a little. Presently, a uniformed woman came to our table with a slightly mangled umbrella and asked if it belonged to any of us. Suzie gushed, "Oh, it's mine! Um... what happened to it?"

"Didn't you read the sign against the low wall there?" ground out the irate manager. "It says to not lean anything against the wall. This thing got caught as the restaurant went around, and we had to get two engineers to wrench it out! Read the sign. DON'T. EVER. DO. THAT. AGAIN!" And off she stomped.

As expected, the food wasn't memorable, but the mutilated umbrella and Penelope's inherent trust in me was. I never did tell my parents about the drink as I knew they'd freak out and use the incident as further ammunition against the outspoken, shit-disturbing feminist they disliked Penelope of proudly being.

The last time I saw Penelope was eight years ago, when she came to visit us in Seattle while I was pregnant with my first child. She brought up the birthday drink at Harbour Centre, and asked if I remembered that night which had happened ten years previously. "Of course I do," I exclaimed. "That was one of the turning points in my life, when I realized I could do whatever I wanted or felt comfortable with because I knew I was accountable only to myself and God, and it wasn't a sin to order a drink if I was responsible. Also, I knew you trusted me, and that made me trust myself."

"Well," Penelope grinned. "That was the moment I realized that a fifteen-year-old girl could re-inspire me to say a big 'F.U.' to convention and whatever everyone else around me thought. I've watched you grow up since I started teaching you when you were around eight, and there were times when I was really worried because I saw what you were going through at home, but I couldn't do much about it without dragging you and your brother and sister through more potential hell.

"Until that night, I didn't know for sure if you'd be okay. But, when that server came to our table, you sat up straight, looked him in the eye, and ordered that drink without a hint of fear or potential regret. At that point, I completely stopped worrying for you; I knew you'd be just fine. And I really needed it then, because you helped me make a decision *I* had to make that ended up being completely right for me. So thank you."

And that is the story of Penelope, my very first drink, how a friend nearly broke a city landmark, and the moment I realized I could make my own decisions with courage and confidence... all at the Top of Vancouver.

The end.