People Have 401(k)s, Rebecca

September 12, 2023

The Crystal City Sports Pub (CCSP) is an American institution. Okay, it’s actually a family-owned (and family friendly!) sports bar in a neighborhood in Arlington, VA that is two metro stops away from the Pentagon. It’s on a hip little street (23rd) surrounded by other restaurants and bars, a consignment shop, a tailor, and one ambiguous place called “The Flirt Lounge” which I believe is a hookah bar but is absolutely not a place I personally would go to “flirt”. CCSP is also right down the street from a well-known strip club called “The Crystal City Restaurant”. People often get the two establishments confused. When I lived in Arlington (Pentagon City), I would tell gentlemen on Bumble that I loved the CCSP, and they would be a little bit confused but also altogether too excited that I was a strip club aficionado. Unfortunately for them, I am actually a mediocre-bar-food aficionado and gravitate more toward the well-lit sports pub.

I’ve had some really amazing memories at CCSP. I went there by myself on Halloween one year, all dressed up in my Rockford Peach costume. The owner’s wife was my waitress that night and she was very upset when I said I was trying to emulate Dotty Henson. “Clearly you’re Kit”, she said. People at the bar kept shouting “There’s no crying in baseball!” as I enjoyed my buffalo chicken tenders, a baked potato and a Mountain Dew. My ex and I used to go there a lot, especially on evenings when a local band called “Junk Food” was playing on the 2nd floor. The lead singer of that band would sometimes have solo sets there, and he had a whole gaggle of groupies that showed up for every show. They would all get sloshed and dance around the tables. I think most of them were related to him in one way or another, and like clockwork, there would always be a moment toward the end of the evening where he would invite his blonde sister-in-law up to the microphone to do her incredibly mediocre rendition of Miranda Lambert’s “Tin Man”. That song is depressing when Miranda sings it, but when someone with far less talent sings it, it’s damn near unbearable – especially the 40th time you’ve heard it. Josh and I would be crying laughing every time we got to witness this one-trick-pony.

When I started at Deloitte (gulp…seven years ago), my first project was on a three-man team. One of those teammates was my good buddy, Matt. Matt is one of the sharpest data scientists I’ve ever met, and we really got along from jump because we both come from small town America. He’s from South Dakota and like me, found himself living in a large metropolitan area for a fancy job. I can’t really recall how our friendship unfolded. I think I met his girlfriend Jessi at a Christmas party once, and it seems like the rest is history. They have become two of my absolute favorite people. I love how unequivacally authentic they both are. I love that when I hang out with them, I never feel like a third wheel. I love how good they are to each other and how much hope they give me that I, too, may find my “person” some day. I love that they are always down for tacos at Eastern Market on a Saturday and a stroll through a bookstore.

Matt and I also connected pretty early on in our relationship over a mutual love for the Crystal City Sports Pub. There’s a really terrible app called Fishbowl that a lot of professionals in the consulting industry use. If you remember the really toxic app called Yik Yak from college, it’s similar. People on the app are anonymous and your handle on the app just describes what company you work for (the usual suspects: Deloitte, PWC, BCG, BAH) and your level in the company. To absolutely no one’s surprise, the anonymity makes people behave like monsters on there. I was on that app for about 24 hours in 2017 and then deleted it forever because I saw a post where people were comparing how much wealth they had in liquid assets in the public forum and it left a bad taste in my mouth (and made me feel poor). While I was serving my 24-hour Fishbowl sentence, I saw an innocuous post on there where someone was asking about dining options in Arlington. I saw a reply on that thread: “I’ll die on this hill, Crystal City Sports Pub is the best Arlington has to offer.” I came into the office the next day and said “Matt…was that you on Fishbowl last night?” It was! I’m telling you, this friendship was handcrafted by the universe.

We are all super busy, but Matt and Jessi and I usually find time to meet up every couple of weeks. They live in DC and I love that they encourage me to come to the city for tequila festivals, lego exhibits at the building museum, fancy Mexican restaurants in Takoma Park, and the aforementioned Eastern Market burrito stand. But sometimes Jessi and I will text during the week and realize that we are tired (and hungry) and we need an evening at the CCSP. We met up there on Labor Day last week and I was telling them about my most recent romantic disaster. I was telling them about a man I met at a bar who complimented my red high heels by asking me “If you click those three times, do you think you’ll go home?” We went on a few dates and then he kind of disappeared. I was lamenting it to them saying “I dunno, it was nice to meet someone in the wild instead of on an app and I thought things were going well. And he has a job and a 401(k)…or at least a thrift savings plan. But he is basically homeless. He’s couch surfing on friends’ couches because he sold his house a while back and hasn’t decided whether to rent or buy next.” Matt interrupted me to say “People have 401(k)s, Rebecca! We have to raise the bar here! We aren’t in small town America anymore, people have 401(k)s!” See, these are the truths I need friends to shout at me over chicken fingers and beer.

I went out this weekend and smiled at a man wearing a green shirt. He smiled back. All I talked about with my friend for the next hour was how I was confused as to why that man smiled at me and then walked out of the bar without talking to me. The absolute audacity! I swear men are 70% water and 30% audacity. Then he reappeared, like Mr. Darcy walking through that foggy field to find Lizzie Bennet at the end of Pride of Prejudice (the movie, that shit didn’t happen in the book). Except imagine that Mr. Darcy was realllllllllly drunk. Anyway, he walked through the proverbial fog, up to the bar to order another beer and then turned to me and said “Hi.” We started chatting with him and his friend and quickly learned that he is a Principal at BCG. This job title may not mean much to the masses, but to people in consulting, it means something, and to me it means this: He is a successful man who likely makes more money than I do. Weeeeeeee! The rain started pelting my parade float when he told me he actually lives in Las Vegas and was just in town for his friend’s birthday. DAMMIT. A nice man with pretty green eyes and a GREAT job thought I was pretty (at least he did when he was 7 beers deep) and he lives all the way out in Sin City. Thanks, universe. Anyway, this tidbit of information apparently didn’t stop me from making out with him in a parking lot at 2 am. The whole next day I was feeling pretty proud of myself for finally kissing a man who is more successful and important than I am, even though he walked out of my life forever shortly after. I texted Matt and Jessi to tell them about the exciting event.

See, Rebecca, people have 401(k)s.

I don’t know if this blog was an ode to Matt and Jessi, CCSP or green-eyed men with 401(k)s – but maybe I just want the world to know that I appreciate all of them.