The Tender Bar

J.R. Moehringer

Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | YA | Published in 2005

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Chapters 38-40Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 38-40 Summary

The author begins Chapter 38 by reflecting on his post-Sidney romantic relationships. Although he met a young woman, Michelle, whom he really liked, he did not feel he was good enough for her, and he thought it was an “act of kindness” to her to not be in her life (309). Instead, he pursued casual relationships with women at Publicans, though never committing to an exclusive relationship. At around this time, an old friend informed him that Sidney was getting married—news that sickened Moehringer. He was happy, however, to hear rumors that he was going to be promoted at the Times. Unfortunately, one editor's vote of disapproval was enough to prevent this advancement, and Moehringer was devastated to learn that he would not get a reporter job after all.

At this time, he moved back into his grandfather’s house, where his cousin McGraw was spending the summer. Unfortunately, McGraw was considering quitting his baseball career, which enraged his mother, Ruth, and Moehringer and McGraw spent most of the summer at Publicans to hide from her constant abuse. Moehringer was again depressed and discouraged about his career and wanted to escape Manhasset and backpack around Ireland with McGraw. He and McGraw tried gambling on horse racing and poker to raise enough money to travel, though with little success. The chapter ends with Moehringer foreshadowing that he would come to rely on the bar—and drinking—increasingly in the future.

Chapters 38-40 Analysis

Moehringer’s reflections on his romantic relationships illuminate how his many scarring experiences with Sidney had changed his outlook on romantic love. He remembers a distinct irony about the situation, being betrayed and jilted by her noncommittal attitude made him paranoid about being hurt again, and he therefore became as aloof and unattainable as she was. He began to resemble the very person who hurt him.

Moehringer demonstrates how much he has changed since this time in his twenties by admitting that he regrets having turned down Michelle, a “loyal, kind, true” woman from Manhasset (307), and sharing that he should have “thrown myself at her, dedicated all my energy to winning her” but was too jaded from his experience to do so (307).

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He recalls his alarm at dating a woman who helped him understand part of why he was always so taken with Frank Sinatra. When she questioned him about his childhood, he realized that Sinatra albums were one of the few items his father had left behind and that he had listened to Sinatra when he could not find The Voice on the radio. Distressed at how easily his date had extracted this revelation, he never contacted her again. Moehringer uses a metaphor comparing New York’s gritty harbor to the human psyche to show the many thoughts he had repressed and how frightened he was at the thought of confronting them. He explains that he and Bob the Cop felt that “things at the bottom of our inner harbours should float up in their own time, of their own accord” (309).