Tosca Cafe on Columbus

We took a table in the private 'backroom' where the stars liked to eat--Sean Penn, Pavorotti, Robert Redford--but was filled instead with dot.com kids and youngish stock traders with their dates. The dot.com kids were getting efficiently drunk all by themselves in the corner and the stock traders were talking too loudly, the theory being that stock traders talk loudly at their work so that loud talk becomes a habit, but that investment bankers are quiet.

The guy at the next table was 33, I'm guessing 33 because he was young enough to still be a master-of-the-universe and old enough to know better. His hair was short, but oiled anyway in the fashion of Leonardo DiCaprio playing a businessman in a Martin Scorcese hit-film, he wore a dark suit and an open collar dress shirt that looked like it needed a tie. His date was more like 23, with bright red hair and a basic black dress that amplified her assets. She even laughed at jokes missing their punchlines.

We could hear every word of their conversation--he did all the talking, she did most of the laughing--and very little of our own. "He's a stock trader," my friend said, "they talk very loudly and as if they're the only people in the world."

We started talking as loudly. The couple beside us didn't seem to notice. When our cannolli came, we rejected it loudly and with emphasis because it was so awful and so that the waiter knew we meant business.

Talking loudly was fun, not only could we hear one another but we both became far more aware of what we were saying. There was power in loudness, I could feel the power building to a crescendo in which I would soon could become the loudest, most powerful person in the room.

Then the check came, there's always a quiet when the check comes. We both thanked the waiter in calm, measured tones. (Another restaurant phenomenon:the habit of thanking the waiter when the check comes.)

When we stood up and gathered our things to leave, the stock trader at the next table said to us, "I guess I shouldn't order the cannolli, right?"