‘EGGS AND ICED TEA’
Allen Forrest is a painter and cartoonist, winner of the Leslie Jacoby Honor for Art at San Jose State University's Reed Magazine, his Bel Red landscape paintings are in the Bellevue College Foundation's art collection. He lives in Vancouver, BC, Canada.
EGGS AND ICED TEA
Claire, a New York City seafood restaurant, that was located on Seventh Avenue in Chelsea, closed her doors in 2001. I had taken my parents there. For reasons to which he didn’t expand, my father hated it. Not because of the menu, I don’t think. I never found out what it was, but something beyond the fare. Taking over Claire’s location was a restaurant/bar called Elmo (short for El Morocco).
One of the most respected art dealers at the time, not just in New York City but throughout the world, was Mary Boone. She had been Leo Castelli’s Director at his West Broadway location in Soho, before opening her own gallery at 417 West Broadway, directly across the street from Castelli. She then moved with the mass exodus of downtown galleries to the far edge of Chelsea, near the banks of the Hudson River. Boone, a friend to one of the owners of Elmo, sold (or gave) the restaurant a selection of large scale paintings and mixed media canvases upon its opening to decorate the restaurant walls.
====
I had never been to Elmo. Even many years after it first opened, I would walk past to find the place filled to the rafters with fashionable New Yorkers and tourists — and a lot of men. Though listed in some guide books as a gay restaurant, it was by no means exclusive. I would (and do) take straight friends and family there, and with a significant mixed crowd, no one, to my knowledge, feels uncomfortable.
At the time I first sauntered by, I was working for Mimi Ferzt Gallery in Soho, which represented Post Stalinist nonconformist art from the Soviet Union. Nothing truly comparable to what Mary Boone Gallery exhibited. The great advantage to showing art from this specific culture is that the focus wasn’t specific to a style or school. And even those artists with long museum biographies brought much lower prices than western works with similar provenance. If you are a person who happens to be educated on contemporary art, that will be clear. If that reads obnoxious, I apologize. That was not my intention.
====
On one of my days off, which was always during the week, I would have lunch at an Eighth Avenue restaurant in Chelsea called Food Bar, which catered primarily to a gay clientele. When they closed their doors, I looked for another restaurant that had a certain vibe. I admit that includes having gay customers.
Probably a tradition set because of my schedule, I embraced dining alone, either reading or writing, depending on my mood. I grew to enjoy and look forward to the solitude and the white noise of the crowds. The discovery of this private, alone time was cathartic. I still do not usually invite friends to join me for an afternoon meal.
The first time I walked into Elmo was on a Memorial Day Monday. The manager at the time, a French man from the southern provinces named Frederic, offered me seating at a corner table set for three. I said to him, “I’m sorry, I’m alone.” Fred responded, “take the table.” That was more than a decade ago. Though Fred moved with his wife and family to San Francisco, I have been going to Elmo at least once a week ever since.
====
When I first came to Elmo, I became aware of how handsome most of the wait staff was. The model-like men would walk by my table, somewhat expressionless, but staring at me. It was weeks before I realized that the waiters weren’t looking at me at all. They were checking themselves out in the mirrored wall behind me.
The bar scene on the other side of the restaurant is its own flavor. After I finish my eggs and iced tea, I often take a seat at the bar, if one is available. I only write while sitting alone at my table, never at the bar. No one told me to adhere to that etiquette, but I decided having put up a barrier
of not wanting to be disturbed while writing was okay at one of the dining tables, but I knew it was isolating and rude to do so at the bar, which only has about a dozen stools for their patrons.
I have made some bar friends there, though we don’t socialize outside of the establishment. With the exception of two employees, I have not maintained friendships that travel beyond the confines of the restaurant. If intending to put a label on Elmo, it’s an upscale diner, serving American comfort food. There is somewhat of an elite feel to the place, but the staff is incredibly friendly. Though I think I have a good radar, I’m not sure who does and doesn’t genuinely like me. I am well aware that you can like someone and not want to invite a friendship. My “day job” is also a hospitality position, so I am gregarious and friendly with guests: even those I wouldn’t ever want to see again. For the most part, the patrons I service are kind and generous. Even when I probe beyond politeness, I hopefully don’t form questions that are too personal. Asking someone something as mundane as “where are you from?” can open up a world of comfortable and appreciative discussion.
There are straight people who come in to have a meal or cocktails at Elmo’s bar, even with the gay majority. Personally I have never pursued anything beyond friendly banter while drinking there. I prefer to sit at the very end of the bar, where the staff congregates. I’m sure they wouldn’t appreciate my thought process, since I presume most of them see this gig as a necessary job so they are able to financially survive while pursuing work in one of the performing arts fields. I eavesdrop and have the nerve to consider myself one of the gang, though I doubt they think of me that way.
From time to time, I have considered finding a different hang-out or staying at home to save some money. But I have not only become used to this tradition, I like having a place to go where I am recognized. I have been single for years and though I’m not adverse to being coupled, I’m probably better — and have been surprisingly happier — alone. I don’t know that thirty years ago I would have felt secure going out to eat by myself, but now it’s something I look forward to. And I finally have embraced telling strangers that I’m a writer. Something that took me a long time to own, let alone say out loud.
I have been fortunate to have had a number of my short stories published over the years. The majority of the work has been written at one of the front tables at Elmo.
As I am forced to inevitably face the fact that I’m no longer young, I still find myself in adolescent-like denial. I regularly forget that truth until I am staring into a well lighted mirror. Meeting a partner in the name of love is mostly a young person’s game. Particularly if you’ve been single for many years. If you find someone while young with whom to grow older, there is cemented commitment that can carry you through the years with practiced compromise and safety. Almost everyone I know who is single and around my age, whether they admit it or not, is searching for a younger person to hook. One of the great advantages to patronizing a place like Elmo is that it’s not singly a bar made up of desperate souls in an unrealistic search. It has a broad array of guests who know that when they come there, they can create their own place setting, without judgement or criticism. And the drink menu is serious.
Andrew Sarewitz has published a number of short stories (website: www.andrewsarewitz.com) as well as having penned scripts for various media. Mr. Sarewitz is a recipient of the City Artists Corp Grant for Writing. His play, Madame Andrèe (based on the life of WWII resistance fighter, Nancy Wake, the “White Mouse”), garnered First Prize from Stage to Screen New Playwrights in San Jose, CA; produced with a multicultural cast and crew. Member: Dramatists Guild of America.
