Gestures and Rituals

The Libation Quotation for this Wednesday inspires me to do a bit of reading. Perhaps I'll hit the library later this week, because this is not the first time I've found a reference to this book, and what I've found has always been great.

"He pulled three dollars from my pile and winked at me. I understood that my drinks were free, while drinks I bought for others were not ... I realized that the same rule must apply when a man offered to buy me a drink. Uncle Charlie would charge the man a dollar or two as a token. Money wasn't the issue. It was the gesture, the timeless gesture. Buy another man a drink. The whole bar was an intricate system of such gestures and rituals."

~from The Tender Bar by J.R. Moehringer