Skeletons Return

So, after I wrote the post about my grandpa, 2 of my customers, Laurie and Marilyn, came into the restaurant. They stopped me, they had read the blog.

“We think our father worked with your grandfather,” Marilyn told me.

“We think he was at our brother’s bar mitzvah,” Laurie added. Their father was a lawyer and his best clients were owners of eye glass companies in New York, one who was Abraham Sutain. They were sure that there was a photo of him at Steven’s bar mitzvah, so a few weeks later when Steven came to San Miguel, the 3 of them walked in, Steven holding his laptop.

He opened the file of his bar mitvah photos from 1958 and began swiping past the party guests, most of the men reminded me of Alfred Hitchcock and the women Ethel from “I love Lucy”, until he came to my grandparents.

“There they are,” I said without needing to swipe further. I was expecting my mom to walk through the door at any moment, I was excited to watch her identify an old photo of her parents from the album from this family she had never met. But the restaurant started to fill up so I couldn’t sit through the swiping and when I came back inside I saw Steven putting away his laptop and focusing on his burger.

“Did she see them?” I asked.

“No,” the 3 shook their heads, maybe as disappointed as I was that the identity wasn’t confirmed. I wished that I had a photo of my grandfather there to show them like I showed them a photo of my grandmother to prove that it was true. And that for some reason my mom couldn’t recognize her own parents.

“I gave you a copy of the photo album of your grandparents,” she said.

“No, you didn’t,” I argued. “I don’t have photos of grandpa.” She brushed me off and didn’t seem to care whether or not they had been at Steven’s bar mitvah in 1958. It really bothered me for weeks after, until I realized why.

As my grandparents sat enjoying cocktails and being seen at the lawyer’s son’s bar mitzvah dinner. My grandfather, the successful sunglass designer with his flawless wife at his side. Leslie, my mother, was 11 years old, at home, trapped in trauma with her nemesis, her older sister Phylis, who my mom claims hated her from the day she was born. Leslie was surviving the peak of her childhood abuse, the kind of abuse that forces people inward, turning to other personae in order to block their reality. Until one day, as a fun thing to do on one’s journey of self-discovery, she had a session with a hypnotist who does past life regressions, but always starts with this life in order to let go of early childhood issues. Who’da thought they were about to open a can of worms impossible to reseal and probably should have stopped there with the recommendation that she follow up with therapy just to deal with the memories that she had supressed for most of her life. And for her to seek forgiveness for the mother that should have protected her.

Not to excuse her blind eye, but Mildred, my grandma, had her hands full with 4 children and a husband that gifted other women jewelry and mink coats, then went home and terrorized his family. Mildred would never lose composure, never let people know what went on in her home, as if she were just hiding the Christmas tree in the shower, so others wouldn’t talk or judge. If she were to protect her children then someone would have to know and she would risk losing everything. Losing her husband and all of the money that he had earned while she scraped and saved before his success to one of the other women. Losing the future of her scheduled weekly visits to the hairdresser, manicures and mahjong with the girls. One day after I had separated from my kids’ abusive fatherI cried to my grandma over the phone .

“He says he’s going to take my kids from me,” I told her.

“That’s nonsense,” she said. “Call his bluff, give him the kids, take a weekend off, go to a spa. By Monday he’ll be giving them back.” Ofcourse I didn’t take her advice. I couldn’t phathom the idea of my children walking out the door thinking that I didn’t want them. Or my little girl packing a bag thinking that her mother was sending her to live with the man that kicked her across her bedroom leaving her with a black eye. I get that those were different times. A woman shrugged off her dreams of a happy life like an expensive shawl in a shop that she knew she could only keep for a glance in a mirror. A woman didn’t just pluck her children out of their home and make a new life for herself, even if it meant spending a lifetime with a tyrant who she despised. I’m assuming that was the case, because I never saw a tender exchange between them. Even though they shared a lifetime of children, apartments and trips together. Even though she cared for him while he was dying and spoke about him as if he were still alive after his death.

Leslie had talents and dreams that she wasn’t willing to let her father pocket like a cheap set of salt and pepper shakers from a delicatessen table and luckily was from a different era. As soon as the opportunity arose she stole one of Abe’s cadillacs and drove away. Far away. She knew that whatever was out there was better than where she was. And far away meant that she could move on and forget. About the couple in the photo.

Skeletons Out of the Closet

I had a scary moment. Not a Freddy Krueger scary moment, but a real life, this-is-what’s-coming-next moment. Every year I put together an altar in the restaurant in the room where I keep my collection of Day of the Dead art. Every year there are more photos of those recently departed, mostly customers, since I come from a small family, the majority of whom I lost long ago. Starting with my father who died when I was 5, I never met him since my mom fled, pregnant, from a life in Mexico with a man who sometimes came home, usually didn’t. Who, soon after she left, ended up in prison. And, soon after he was released, ended up dead. My aunt Valerie died at 27 from a heroin overdose. My cousin was murdered in his apartment at the age of 34. Grandma Millie died at 93 from colon cancer. Grandma Aida passed away in bed with an open beer on her nightstand as she watched t.v.. And my dog, Maddy, that I lost last year to lymphosarcoma. The one that I have never included on the altar is my grandfather. I guess I figure that he should not have been allowed to mingle with the living, so the dead should be spared.

As a child I did love him, he took me to all the amusement parks and went on all the rollercoaster rides with me. He taught me to play pool and would only let me drink beer or seltzer, on occasion a Dr. Brown’s Black Cherry soda at a deli. My grandpa, Abe Sutain, was very talented and built a successful company. You can google Sutain Sunglasses. He liked to sit on his apartment’s terrace painting identical reproductions of masterpieces by famous artists. Da Vinci, Monet, Gauguin, Dalí, van Gogh. Elegantly framed to decorate his walls. He ate a macrobiotic diet for years and dark chocolate while watching opera in bed. He gave himself acupuncture and could stand on his head for a long time. He brushed his teeth with a powder of black, seaweed, long before people knew about the harmful effects of flouride. He hated both doctors and dentists alike. One afternoon when I was about 10 we went to visit his sister Shirley. Shirley had also invited her brother-in-law who was a dentist. I’m thinking, after my recent invisalign treatment, he was a good one. He met me for the first time and told my grandparents that I should be taken to see an orthodontist, because I appeared to have a cross-bite. My grandma made an agreeable comment, like,

“Maybe we’ll look into that.” My grandpa picked up her steaming cup of coffee to throw in her face. His sister Shirley grabbed his arm, the coffee burning his hand before he could splash it on my grandma, who sat so still, without a breath, as if she were hiding. Shirley pulled me into the bathroom of her tight apartment. She closed the door and told me to cover my ears while my grandpa attacked my grandma with spitting threats.

“I’m gonna leave you, you fucking whore,” he said.

That night I asked my grandma where she would go? I assumed that what he always said was true. That no one was worth shit without him. We, including me, would be out on the street without his money. Little did I know that he had already left his family for another woman who, along with a partner, swindled him out of his company and a good portion of his money. My grandma, even though she lived in denial about the abuse that occurred in her household, put money aside to secure her future. So, when my granddfather begged her to take him back, she did, with conditions, with a say on how the remaining money would be spent and saved.

“Nowhere, ” she said, “he’s the one leaving.” Of course he never left, until he died of throat cancer from a lifetime of cigarette smoking. Grandma had to take care of him and change his diapers, which he would take off and smear his feces on the walls between his paintings. Eventually she was left with no choice but to put him in the hospital, the last place he wanted to go. They had to force his emaciated body kicking, scratching and biting into the ambulance. And even after he was gone she was haunted by his opression and constant chatter that she had learned to quiet as she filled out crossword puzzles and chime in with “um hum” and “you don’t say” at exactly the right time to assure she was listening. Because his temper was like a mess of bare wires that could start to spark for no particular reason. During a family summer visit at my grandparent’s apartment in Santa Monica there was a discussion about bagels and lox and if we preferred Canter’s or Nate ‘n Al’s. My aunt Valerie, the one who didn’t make it past 27, voted Nate ‘n Al’s, maybe because of the quality or maybe just because it was more exciting to go to Beverly Hills and see movie stars. For whatever reason, probably because it was cheaper, grandpa preferred Canter’s. He grabbed Val by the hair and smashed her head against the wall. A few years later, when I sat in the car outside the morgue as my other aunt, Phylis, went in to identify Valerie’s body, my grandfather cried to me, saying that it was all his fault. Everyone agreed.

My mom came in for dinner, she went to visit the altar.

“Where did you get that photo of your father?” she asked.

“What do you mean?” I said.

“It’s not from my album,” she said.

“And what album would that be?” I asked almost choking on an oatmeal cookie.

“The album of the photos that were taken of Raúl and I in Acapulco.”

“Mom, all the photos we have of Raúl came from Aida.” Aida was the reason that I moved to Mexico, to be close to her the last years of her life. The reason that I tracked her down, really not expecting her to still be alive, was because I grew up without a photo of my father. No album of my parents in Acapulco. Nothing but anecdotes of my father as the life of the party pouring champagne down fountains of glasses, scaling his apartment building to climb through the window and his recipe for vinaigrette. I was almost angry about her memory lapse and her fantasy photo album before it hit me. She doesn’t remember.

Knives & Forks

It was our first day back to work after a 9 day vacation. For me, my second staycation of the year. Time for painters to scrape the humidified walls down, replaster and brush on some fresh paint in the restaurant. And for me to catch up on my ME time. I never thought of myself as a home-body or a hermit, but people change and working with people for so many years changes a person. Teaching and re-teaching employees to do their jobs, the way that I want them done, gets tiresome. I used to be a perfectionist, but the Gordon Ramsay-temper-tantrum approach to running a restaurant kitchen doesn’t apply to Mexico. I know that if I get too critical, too mean, too angry, I could would end up standing alone behind a grill staring at a line of orders. I don’t have the energy for that anymore. Unless I were to simplify my life and fix a pot of soup each day on a portable burner under a market tarp and dish it out until it was gone. But there’s no turning back now, so I need my staff. And in all fairness, I am lucky to have the crew that I have now. 85% of the time they are responsible, dedicated and do their best each according to his/her ability.

So, coming back to work felt fresh. We had all taken a breath. We could remember that we like being where we are, doing what we do and, according to the customers filling the patio tables, we were missed. When the initial rush had calmed, a customer, a woman I have known many years, came in. I hadn’t paid too much attention to anyone that day, I was still trying to unpack and regroup from the whirlwind of dusty repairs. I was sort of aware that her plate had gone back to the kitchen, but assumed there had been a mistake. I was then informed that there was a long, black hair on top of the garnish of lettuce, tomato, avocado, onion and pickles like an unrequested ingredient. I looked at the cook, Jiovani, a handsome, clean-shaven young man who keeps his hair perfectly buzzed on the sides with a little length on the top that, during work hours, is covered by a baseball cap. Jiovani shrugged and told me that he, alone, had plated her food. Diego, the sous-chef, equally as clean-cut, also wearing a baseball cap, joined the huddle over the hair. The 2 women in the kitchen had been working far from the plate, both who wear their hair in tight buns that look as if they are pasted to their heads. I shrugged back. I wasn’t ready to start dosing the insane drug of people pleasing. Not to say that I approve of plates going out with hair on them, but it has happened to me in restaurants and if it is just 1 random hair that has fallen on the plate, I’ll pick it off, same as I would spoon out a fruit fly that has drowned in my wine and continue drinking it. I decided to leave it up to the waiter to offer to make whatever changes she desired.

As I walked past her in the patio to seat someone else she called out to me.

“Did you hear what happened to me?”

“Give me a minute,” I said. I put the new arrival’s drink order in and went back to the kitchen to find out what happened with the hair. Not like I actually wanted the culprit, I just wanted to know how they remedied the situation. But it was still sitting on the counter like the last child at school on a bench waiting for her mother to come get her. Jiovani picked it up and placed it between my index finger and thumb as if to medically dispose of the issue. I took it back to her.

“I apologize, but my cook, the only one who had a hand in preparing your plate, has a buzz cut under a baseball cap, I know it didn’t come from him. And it’s not mine,” I said pointing to my mahogany, henna- colored hair.

“Well, it’s not mine,” she said grabbing the long, black ponytail hanging down her shoulder. I looked at the hair and looked at her. She read my mind. “My hair is straight and that’s curly,” she said with disgust as if it were an extra long pube. “I was really enjoying my meal until,” I didn’t wait until she finished.

“Again, I am sorry, it happens, we are human.” I left it at that. Because that’s what’s real. Even though people like believing in their fairy godmother of food, sometimes disguised as a sexy, chef with a scruffy beard and loose curls that would never dare fall from his head. Who waves a magic wand and fulfills their wishes spoken somewhere between tummy and tongue. Their cravings cut and stabbed on the tip of a fork or comfort cradled in a spoon. The knife and fork are rolled together in a magic napkin as if wrapping 2 lovers in their dream sheet. There are no waiters fumbling utensils between their fingers. No cook behind a hot grill, salty sweat dripping from his brow. No disheveled dishwasher to lose a strand of hair.

Clicking My Heels

It was about 20 years ago that I started my restaurant career. I walked into a corner building that was for rent, 2 and a half blocks up from San Miguel’s center square, which, at the time, was considered far off the tourist trail. It had been a dark, dirty bar that the proprietors abandoned, leaving behind debts, piles of garbage and a flat-top grill, that I would end up purchasing from the landlord. All the windows had cardboard boxes nailed over them and thick, red curtains covering the boxes. To match was wall to wall, cigarette burned, puke stained, red carpeting. None of the doors that opened onto the 2 small patios closed, so the building smelled of the 6 months that the neighborhood cats had been squatting there leaving behind the heads and tails of mice that had been burrowing in the garbage. Honestly what was I thinking? How could I walk in there and think it was the perfect place to move into with 2 small children and open a business that I had no training or experience in?

I spent at least a couple of months cleaning, painting and furnishing the street level dining space, along with having the plumbing repaired. During that time the kid’s father and I were co-habitating, since the kitchen and bathrooms were not yet functional. I cooked dinner at home, but picked up tortas from the sandwich shop a few doors down for the painter and myself. I moved the kids and I into our new home and spent 1 month in bed with 2 types of typhoid plus a potpourri of bacterias and parasites. Luckily my kids’ aunt, Flor, was there to take care of them while I layed in bed shivering, sweating and running to the bathroom with severe vomiting and diarrhea. Once I was well enough to get out of bed and return to the grind of getting kids to school, I resumed executing the dream of a restaurant that I had been fantasizing about for months. Only in my fantasy it was a family oriented restaurant with games for the kids, and a Donkey named Tito Ele Burrito, basically a Mexican Chuck E. Cheese, since there was nothing like that here. But a project like that would have required an investment much larger than what my mom could provide. So, I downsized on the dream, printed out a short menu, went shopping, prepared the food and opened El Burrito Bistro. I usually had 2 helpers. 1 in the kitchen, 1 to wait tables and myself to do some of both. It was a routine that had me on my feet all day every day.

About 2 years into my venture I began having a sharp pain in my right heel. This was new. I got an xray that showed spikey formations growing out of both of my heels, but for some reason the only one that hurt was the right one. It was painful to take my first steps in the morning and I was limping through my labors. I went to a traumatologist who gave me very painful shots of steroids right into my heel with a really long needle. I went to a naturopath who collected bees in a jar and gave me strategic stings on my foot. The stings swelled and itched and my heel still hurt. I did a past life regression to confront unresolved issues with my feet. One life set me back as a soldier in a war where I/he stepped on a landmine that left me/him without a leg and very bitter. And another as a Native American woman who was tied at the ankles, dragged from the back of a horse by a soldier who took me/her to a shack, raped me/her and slit my/her neck. The regression provided relief for a few days. Then on a 2 week trip to visit my family in the States my mom got me my first pair of MBT sandals. Aaahh, to be able to walk again. And no matter how ugly and expensive, they were the only shoes I wore. After many pain-free years, according to me I was cured. Not like I started buying cowboy boots or pumps, but I could finally purchase comfortable walking sandals and sneakers that didn’t cost $200 dollars like other people.

For over a year now I’ve been doing yoga every morning, I drink plenty of water, I don’t eat junk or processed foods, I sleep better than ever, I take my vitamins, I don’t snort white powders and I only drink alcohol on the weekends. I’d say I’m one of the healthiest, most well-behaved versions of me yet. So you can imagine how shocked I was when I stepped off my bed one morning onto a spike sending pain up my right leg. Only now it wasn’t going away as I warmed up during the day or when I layed down at night. My sleep was disturbed by the aching in the soles of my feet and constant need to flex. I decided I would fix it with yoga, didn’t work. Massage, nope. Then they opened a wellness center in my gated community. There’s a physical therapist that does all kinds of therapies. She started with acupuncture and electromagnetic waves. She found a ball of knotted up tendon in my right calf and stuck a needle right into it. I responded with something between a groan and a growl, truly not expecting pain that intense. I’m used to the kind of acupuncture that relaxes me into an altered state of consciousness.

The therapist sent me away with a prescription, a stretching routine, a list of pain control methods and orders to stay off my feet. Ha! Like that’s gonna happen!

“There could come a day when you might not be able to walk,” she warned.

I left a little worried. I pulled the leg elevating ramp out of my closet and set it on my bed with an infrared heating pad to wrap around my calves and ice packs in the freezer to pillow my feet at night. I am awaiting the arrival of the expensive, orthopedic shoes that I ordered. I get home from work and after brushing my teeth and washing my face, I attend to my feet and legs. I close my eyes and click my heels. I imagine waking up, setting my feet on the floor as if stepping onto a marshmallow. The therapist’s warning is forgotten like a bad dream by noon. I can walk, I can jump, I can fly.

A Lucky Penny

Money is not something I like to think about, least of all ponder global economics, stocks, cybercurrency or any other forms of investment. A few years ago I experienced financial freedom for the first time in my adult life. The ability to cover a whirlpool of expenses without worry. I was able to spend the equivalent of $20,000 dollars on necessary repairs in the house that just sold, but has yet to close. But the past few months I’ve had that money-tight-I-can’t-breathe-feeling, like trying to zip up jeans from the don’t-fit-right-now drawer, wiggling on the bed sucking the air out of my stomach until the button closes, no matter how painful. The panorama is indeed much smoother than in the past when I looked out and saw nothing but pot holes on the road ahead. There will be a rainbow and a pot of gold, but with that comes a lot to consider, decisions to make, study subjects that don’t interest me, grow up and play quarters with straight Campari. So, I am guessing that this stretch of decreased sales, impact from the devalued dollar and my decision to continue funding the repairs at hand regardless of my income is actually a blessing. It forces me to plan ahead, contemplate my next move and look beyond the hand to mouth reality that I have lived by.

My grandma Millie was a star at investing and planning ahead. She tried to teach me early on about making money multiply by playing card games, gambling with beans and always sending me checks to deposit in a savings account. When my mom was short of funds I had the cushion to fall back on. We took family vacations to Las Vegas where my grandfather would sneak my cousin and I into the casino so we could pull the handles of the slot machines until we got kicked out and had to settle for wading in the fountains filling our casino cups with stolen wishes, mostly pennies, but some dimes and even quarters. Money was my family’s entertainment and I was a money magnet, I stumbled upon it. She taught me to look over the curb, because that’s where the rest would be. She was right, I found over a hundred dollars that had blown over a busy New York sidewalk leaving a single dollar bill like a crumb leading to the loaf of bread. One day at a gas station we saw a man drop his whole bill fold, thinking he had put it in his back pocket. She had me run, give it to him and advise him to be more careful and use his front pocket.

When I was about 25 my grandma sent me a check for 2 thousand dollars and told me to go to the bank and buy a CD. I went to the historical Wells Fargo downtown San Francisco, pushed the shiny brass bars and walked through the thick glass doors. I eyed the oversized space that I had visited on a field trip as a child to see the original Wells Fargo stagecoach and tried to decide which of the heavy wood executive desks I should go to but instead u-turned my ass right back out the fancy doors and down the steps direcly to my neighborhood bar to play pool. Years later my grandma asked me about that CD and I told her the truth, that I never bought it. I spent the money on a trip to Mexico. She was disappointed in me and now I am disappointed in that me. Not to say that I would have any of that money, I’m sure it would have been spent long ago. But who knows, maybe it would have opened my eyes to the possibilities of passive income. Who knows maybe I would have discovered other ways to make money aside from severely hard work, from sciatica contracting, heel spur cristalizing, vein spidering hard work. At least I would have had the experience of what it meant to invest, which was the lesson she was trying to teach me.

Here I am 30 years later, having watched my mom lose her lifes’ earnings that could have provided her with a comfortable retirement, I am finally ready to learn. To not be intimidated by opulent doors and stiff numbers, just like I wasn’t afraid of taking off my shoes and collecting coins from the bottom of forbiddened fountains.

Sold

Last Sunday I was walking Jack down the man-made creek that runs through the community’s picturesque canyon. Swarms of swallows crisscrossed our path as Jack sniffed the tiny, magenta flowers blooming from his favorite succulents that cascade the walkway. It was surreal, even though swallows are the signature of San Miguel’s rainy season, I have never had them almost fly into my face. As we walked on I wondered what it meant. I felt anxious. I was about to head out of town to Queretaro with my friend, Hattie, to pick up 4th of July supplies at Costco. I’m not used to fast-paced cities or crowded shopping centers. Jack had been sick the week before, so I was nervous about leaving him alone. I made all these excuses for my anxiety and discarded it.

Hattie and I drove out to the big city. First stop HEB, but, oh look, a Bed, Bath and Beyond right next door. We had to stop in. These 1st world stores are foreign to me. I’m used to limited options and when I want to open the door to more I go to on-line shopping. I can turn it off when I can’t decide. I ran my fingers over the display products as if i had never touched a cuisinart before, I sniffed all the scents of air fresheners and remembered I hadn’t checked my phone. Indeed there was a message from the real estate agent with an offer for my house. A pretty good offer.

“Accept it,” I messaged. I jumped up and down making the I scored fist. Then tears welled up. The Bed, Bath and Beyond employees stared at me. A strange gringa that had never seen appliances or bedding, holding, what would be my only purchase, a six pack of dish towels under my armpit and going through an emotional explotion. I looked for Hattie to share my news. I messaged my daughter, my son and called my mom. Hattie held my dish towels as I set up office on a soap display in the shower curtain section. I had to sign the contract accepting the offer with my pinky on my phone screen. Eventually I settled for the best that I could do.

I was elated as we wove through the crowd in HEB. I had often thought about what this moment would feel like after over a year of pouring money, time and energy into repairing the problems with the property. Which made it hard to commit to the idea of selling the house, I vacillated between selling and renting. But when I imagined having to contend with renters and the inevitable maintenece, I concluded that this would be an overload on my time and energy. Then came the touching up, clearing out and staging. When the rugs were rolled out, beds made and pillows fluffed I looked at my beautiful house with the most spectacular views of San Miguel and expected showings and offers to roll. But it was starting to feel like I wasn’t going to find the right buyer. After every showing the agents told me,

“They loved the house, but the location wasn’t the right fit.”

No, the house is not for someone that can’t walk hills or stairs. Yes, there are nicer areas, but it is in a part of town that many would consider “up and coming”. It is one neighborhood over from one of the most desirable locations in town. A year had gone by, my contract with the agency was up, but I told them I would give them a couple more months, since we were heading into high season and the house had only been staged for 5 months out of the year that they had the listing. I dropped the price a touch and an offer came in, a low offer, I didn’t accept it. We were waiting for the buyer who had flown down from California just to see the house to raise his bid. 2 weeks of a rollercoaster ride waiting to see if there was any word from him went by. When out of the blue a couple took a virtual tour and made an offer! Which, without a haggle, I could accept.

Now I just wait. And clear out the last of the odds and ends. And move furniture, again. And replace the gas tank, my final repair on this house. And sense completion, like inhaling the aroma of a stew its final hour on the stove.

Refrigerator Memoirs

This seems to happen every May. My restaurant falls apart. Refrigerators break down. Like we all need a vacation, refrigerators included. The heat hits San Miguel and customers flee. The staff is overheating and slowing down. And I’m having a hard time keeping the energy reved up as unexpected projects build.

The other week my oldest refrigerator died. I had it for about 18 years. Ever since my first restaurant, El Burrito Bistro. It was my very first for real I have a restaurant refrigerator, it’s mate a full vertical freezer, still working. It had survived 3 moves and honestly I don’t remember when it failed me. Not like my other appliances. My industrial oven that wouldn’t stay lit right before Thanksgiving. My monster, 2 door industrial refrigerator that broke down last May, again this May, has caused me to lose food on many ocassions and cost me a lot of money in repairs over the past 4 years. This fridge, despite it’s tendency to leak regularly, was a trouper. Most of the rubber between the door was falling apart, door compartments cracked, vegetable drawers long gone. I decided not to resucitate. Instead I stopped by the local industrial appliance store and purchased a new refrigerator and new freezer for the bar.

…I’m resuming this post after an extensive intermission. I was at a party the other night and one of my dear customers and friend, Everett, said to me in his thick southern accent,

“I think I’m ’bout ready for another post.”

I had started this ode to past appliances in the midst of a wave of repairs right before closing for a week for vacation. I think I had intended to share my many refrigeration moments in the history of my restaurant. Like when I was laying on my side with chop sticks trying pull a dead mouse out of the fan of the deli case. Its tail had been whipping the blades making a horrible noise, forcing me to unplug and investigate. As I was lying on the floor squealing with each failed attempt at freeing the freshly slain rodent a woman was walking down the stairs.

“Oh, look, she fixes the refrigerators too!”

But I got distracted by the 2 leaky cisterns. The brand new fridge was delivered and didn’t work, the waiters were rearranging refrigerators as if they were squares on a rubix cube. The money sucking monster in the kitchen needed a new fan. Plus I had to set aside funds for the pouring of the cement in the parking lot entrance whilst filling 7 envelopes of the staff’s vacation pay. I was fed up and getting out of town was not in the budget. I scheduled a facial with a friend while Jack got groomed. I went to the dentist for a teeth cleaning. I had some plants repotted. I slept through the night without teas or gummies and if I woke up too early I went back to sleep, an attempt to stockpile sleep like a toilet paper hoarder at the onset of quarantine.

2 days into my staycation I received a call from my head waiter, Rodrigo, he was in the hospital. He had fallen off his roof and broken his clavicle bone. He was given a month’s paid leave from work to heal. I was thankful that it hadn’t been worse, I wasn’t concerned about the inconvenience. I called a stand in dishwasher, so the steady dishwasher could help in the bar. It was covered. But 2 days later I received a message from another waiter, Carlos, informing me that he was taking a job in Cancún. I didn’t have anyone to cover this and for some reason none of the employment sites would let me post an ad. For a night I wallowed in tequila and self-pity of what was inevitable, waiting tables with my only remaining waiter, Paco. Paco the waiter that has been consistently irresponsible in the past. Who I have threatened to fire and given countless last chances. Now he was all I had left.

I dreaded doing a fraction of what my former self used to do without a thought and without a staff of 5. When I started this blog I was working from home, posting elaborate menus, taking the orders, shopping, cooking, packing and delivering the food myself in my beat up Volkswagen stationwagon that had a screwdriver for a stickshift while raising 2 children on my own. But now I was scared, as if I was going to be hurled back in time, the alarm was going to go off before the sun came out and I would have to wake the kids up for school, pack lunches and scramble to not be late.

I messaged my remaining 5 employees to let them know what we would be coming back to, asking them to get the help wanted word out and begging them to come back…rested and ready. And so they were. Even Paco who made amends for his past, stepping up as a star waiter and teacher to the young, new waiter that walked in application in hand and big smile on his face. The refrigerators stayed cold, the doors to the gate opened and closed. It took a lot of sweat and hard work. But I didn’t have to wake up to an alarm. Progress.

Open Sesame

I spent weeks working on the front gate. By working I mean getting other people to make it work. An automatic gate opener has been my dream for a while. 3 years ago, with the on set of COVID, we implemented the closed door policy at La Frontera.

“Why?” People asked. “Did something happen?”

Yes, something happened. COVID. In a country where people live hand to mouth under normal circumstances, where families were not receiving stimulus checks to survive, where pets were being abandoned on countryside roads to fend for themselves, I figured people might get desperate, put on the standard medical face mask, baseball cap and sunglasses and look for easy prey. I saw the heads turning and peering into this large, open space, motorcycles coming and going with deliveries, socially distanced tables filled with foreigners, my staff working and the business prospering despite trying times. I didn’t want to press our luck. Plus the city created all kinds of red tape to be able to obtain a sticker in order to reopen one’s business. I decided to create a very safe space. To fulfill all the requirements and purchase all the required COVID paraphernalia, like the digital thermometer gun, gloves, masks, antibacterial solutions and disinfecting welcome mat (in case someone wants to suck on their shoe), without applying for the sticker or opening my doors.

I took some heat. My daughter, who has marijuana leaves tattooed from hand to shoulder. My daughter, who tried to buy a high school diploma to avoid studying for tests, disapproved of the staff and I not taking the required on-line exam to get the San Miguel safe business sticker. One of my waiters scolded me for not following the rules. And rumors got back to me that a neighbor was telling everyone how I was open illegally. I’m ok with that. It is liberating to accept that people won’t always agree with my decisions.

The closed door took getting used to, but there were advantages aside from the sense of safety. There was a new peace without street vendors, unsolicited musicians and muffled traffic noise. We knew when someone had arrived and needed service, for example. Before people would walk in and go sit at one of the lateral tables and if the waiters were on lunch break and I was in the kitchen, then the customers were left unattended. Having control of the parking was another. I have a parking lot that is big enough for 4-5 cars, depending on how people park. But when the doors are open cars will pile in as if I had unlimited parking, many drivers without the skills to back out. Watching customers drive in and out of my parking lot is like watching a horror movie, I turn my head and peak through my fingers.

Customers got used to the system. Walkers were buzzed in. The waiters ran to help open the door for drivers. Some regulars were so familiar with the gate they even opened it themselves. But over the past few months I felt a diminished enthusiasm to help open the gate. When the kitchen or I yelled out for the waiters to open the gate they responded with groans. It was time for a change, but since pouring cement requires drying time before you can drive over it and vacation time was about 2 months away and I wanted the automatic door opener yesterday, I decided to prep the ground and have the door opener installed. First the gravel had to be removed from the entrance, otherwise the rocks would just get stuck in the door. Then they had to bring in firm dirt and compact it with a tool that looked like a giant espresso tamper. Meanwhile the automatic door opener guy installed the hardware. Unfortunately when all was said and done it was not done, we needed a little walk-in door that could be opened with a key, otherwise I would need more remote controls for the staff, and so we could continue using our buzzers that open the door for walkers from my desk and from the kitchen.

Coordinating this and adapting this old, beat up gate was no small feat. The next challenge was getting used to it and re-training the customers. The first day in use the door knocked a woman over who was making the effort to open it herself. Actually 2 women, because her friend went to help her up off the freshly packed dirt and got wacked by the door too. I ran to the aid of the woman, dressed all in white, covered in dirt, her elbow scraped and bleeding. Nothing some anticeptic spray, bandaids and a complimentary dinner couldn’t fix. First thing the next day I printed out “Beware of Door” signs, not literally, but along those lines.

Save the pouring of cement, I considered project over… just as I finished that thought 1 panel stopped opening. I wanted a happy ending to this story. I wanted a magical door that opens and closes swiftly with the push of a button, an entrance solely for those with hearty appetites and good intentions. Instead I got a work in progress. I got an on-going relationship with an automatic door technician. I got a project on my list of projects that I couldn’t check off. And was left standing in an open door of self-doubt wondering if I’m doing the right thing keeping my doors closed. Doubt that came to a halt when I turned to the monitor and saw my black and white boarder collie, Jack, walking out the gate.

Learning to Draw

I’ve had to speak up 3 times in the last 2 months, which indicates that I must be learning a life lesson. Life lessons are hard, speaking up is harder. My restaurant has become a meeting place for many groups. Game players, writers, insurance companies, church gatherings. This is a good thing, I built this restaurant with patio spaces that can seat 100 people for chairs to be filled. I like people to be comfortable, portions to be generous and for prices to be affordable. A place that will give you a glass of water instead of forcing a bottle on your bill, chips and salsa while you wait for your meal and extra salad dressing free of charge No fru-fru food that sends you in search of a fourth course at a taco stand when you come to La Frontera! But maybe it’s too comfortable.

Lately I’ve had to confront groups that hang out for hours, sip on a lemonade and eat complimentary chips. I have to remind them that this is a business. Last Tuesday, as I’m making change for 6 separate checks for 6 lemonades, I debated with myself about saying something. Because it was a woman’s writing group, because a couple of them are regular customers, because I was tired and really didn’t feel like it. But I got off my ass and went to the table where 2 of the group organizers still sat.

“Excuse me, but I have a request, something I ask of all the groups that meet here. That there is some kind of minimum consumption. You are welcome to come, I have the space, but please order more than a soft drink.” I wanted to say that personally in 3 hours, taking up a table in a restaurant, I would down at least 4 drinks, plus order food, plus leave a 20% tip. Not to say that I’m a glutton or out to flash cash, and I certainly know what it means to be on a budget, but when I go out to a restaurant (which is not often due to my lack of free time) I like to show my appreciation. For the waiters and cooks providing long hours of labor intensive service. For the restaurant owners that pay rolling waves of bills, suppliers, salaries, social security, maintenence, taxes, insurance and have to comply with never ending government red tape, which, in Mexico is a rule book subject to changes with each change in office, so that others can relax, eat and drink without preparation or dishes to wash. For me it’s a moment in life when my wishes are on someone else’s tray.

“I don’t know exactly how we’re going to do that,”one responds. “I mean we’re writing and we don’t want food on the table or waiters interrupting.”

Instead of pointing out the obvious, that they are sitting at a table in a restaurant, where food, drinks and waiters are standard components. Or that they could request that their group meet for lunch and then write. I think I babbled something about my waiters working for tips, my restaurant not being a non-profit club house and that if I was coming to work to serve glasses of water and free chips and salsa I would rather be home napping. Probably not the words of a gracious hostess. To be honest, I didn’t think they would be back. But here they were with an even larger group!

Since I had a whole week to stew and chew on the matter with friends, they gave me different ideas of how to deal with this. One friend mentioned a service charge that European restaurants add on for bread when people don’t order food and just sip on a drink, filling up with bread that was set on the table as a courtesy while the food is prepared. At the moment it seemed like a good solution. So, I told Paco to give everyone at the table a check. Those that only ordered a $30 peso drink got $50 pesos tacked on for service and those that ordered a glass of water $80 pesos, as I took deep breaths trying to lower my blood temperature. I knew I was inevitably going to have to confront them to explain this charge, but first I needed to calm myself. I was in a spin, because this was not just a business issue, this was a boundry issue and an authority issue. I heard the waiter’s tone as he told me the women’s writing group had come back. I gave them the benefit of the doubt and hoped that the organizer had passed on the message, unfortunately that wasn’t the case. Having the customers ignore my requests while the waiters push tables together, refill their glasses of water and lower the shades to keep the sun off their backs for little to nothing in return is definitely seen as a sign of a weak boss.

As Paco was passing out the bills, the organizer came in to use the bathroom.

“Everything good?” She asked smiling at me clulessly.

“Actually, I asked the waiter to give everyone a check, charging a minimum consumption to everyone that didn’t order or only ordered a drink.”

“Why would you do that?” The short, grey-haired woman with a New York accent and eyes that wander in opposite directions came up to my desk.

“Because I told you last week that there was to be a minimum consumption, but apparently it didn’t get through.” I stood up.

“But you didn’t tell this group. And when I decided that I wanted to start meeting here, I asked your waiter and I told him that some people would order drinks and some might not order at all and he said, nooo problem!” She opened her arms as if she were the waiter opening my doors to all the water sucking women writers in town. She stepped towards me passing my personal space and practically stepping on Jack.

“Back off, you’re stepping on my dog.”

“I’m not stepping on your dog.” Jack moved out of the way, so she came even closer, I could feel her breath. I slipped away from the angry woman and went to face 9 angry women.

“I’m here to answer any questions you might have about your checks.” There was a buzz of questions and complaints that if they had only known they would have ordered something. I explained that I had told the organizer the week before that they were welcome to meet and write in my open-air shaded patio as long as they ordered food and drinks, but since that request had fallen upon deaf ears, I decided upon a minimum consumption for the service and space that they received for 3 hours. I even mentioned the service charge in Europe, which I think lacked attitude and accent. I was desperately searching for a way out of this uncomfortable situation.

“And this is my restaurant, I make the rules, not the waiters.” I said walking away, like a kid taking her ball off the court.

Game over.

Life is but a Dream

I’m obsessed with sleep. Sleep meditations. Summertime nighties, sleepytime teas and gummies. I went through at least 5 years with insomnia due to anxiety, stress, too much alcohol and menopause. After stripping my covers down to a sheet and a light cotton bedspread in the dead of winter, waking up countless nights sweaty and kicking off the covers only to be trembling and shivering a few minutes later like a junkie during detox. I finally scored the right supplement for menopause, it’s called Estroven for those of you in search of a remedy, now all I want to do is sleep and there is no shortage of work to keep me in a state of exhaustion.

It’s kind of funny the way I spent most of my life looking for ways to stay awake to study, to travel, to work, to party, to wait for the kids to get home. Then all of a sudden I got walloped with a hangover. From the moment that I get up and make my bed, I’m looking forward to getting back in it. I have recurring dreams of being asleep, in my dreams my eyelids are so heavy, I can’t open them. Like when I was a little girl and my family would go out to dinner to an Italian restaurant in New York City that had red booths, romantic, red, beveled glass candle holders on the table with the dim flickering lights shadowing stucco, white walls with paintings of gondolas. I would curl up on the faux leather, my head on someone’s lap. And I was gone. Spaghetti was, is and probably will always be one of my favorite foods, but I never made it to dinner. I would have to be carried out with a slice of bread and butter that had been placed on the table upon arrival in my stomach.

Aahh, to be that care-free. To know that you can just fall asleep where ever you may be and no one will interrupt you, not even to walk yourself back to the car. You will be cradled in the arms of someone much bigger who will take you safely to your dream space and tuck you in. Anxiety and worry don’t hide in your pillow like lice in your bedding waking you up with itchy thoughts. Even though your eyes burn a crystal meth burn, you can’t keep them closed, because light is creeping through the folds of the curtains. You convince yourself that those moments that you do keep your eyes closed are enough to energize you. You await the alarm as the morning sounds get louder, beginnning with chirping birds and escalating to bulldozers. The days’ events play out as if you were awake getting them done, they might drift into dream for a minute only to be cut short by the dreaded alarm.

But now the morning construction outside my door may as well be a flock of fairies serenading me with lullabies. I’m in the best sleeping room I have ever had. It’s like Jeannie’s cushioned bottle. If you are from my generation, then you know that Jeannie was the beautiful blonde genie trapped in the bottle waiting for the handsome astronaut to let her out so that she could make his wishes come true and when her work was done she got sucked back inside and in some sick way many of us little girls at the time fantasized of being Jeannie and having a room like the inside of her bottle that had the vibe of a cozy, safe opium den. So I have my dream room, there’s just enough space for a king size bed with a teal velvet head board, hot pink throw pillows, plum purple black-out curtains, night stands and a polypropolene, pink, orange and yellow Turkish rug where I can throw down my yoga mat. High ceilings keep the room cool, a perfect passage way through the dressing room to the bathroom that I can maneuver without turning on lights. Jack sleeps on his bed in the corner, his snores are deep and comforting. I row until I’m too tired, then I just release the oars and drift into dreams of dreaming.