Just Cured - Experience Fine Foods

There was something in the air in my new work neighborhood yesterday, and in a good sort of way. It was hard for me to put my finger on anything specific, however, that made it seem that way.

It certainly wasn’t the morning of downpours that brightened anyone’s mood. And it could not have been the afternoon’s stifling humidity; the humidity only made the lower than forecast temperatures seem a lie. It wasn’t the air that was in the air.

Maybe I was struck by the sense of calm when I entered Tucker’s early in the lunch hour. The restaurant was packed, and Carla was off for the day attending to her mother’s knee replacement surgery. Perhaps the customers noticed her absence and were a little more patient and a lot less demanding. Certainly the staff stepped up to the short-handed challenge. They exuded that professional get-it-done attitude that I expect (but rarely actually experience) in restaurants with much greater aspirations. Well done, guys and gals; I was so proud of you –† you were certainly affected by that something special in the air.

Maybe it was the concentration of “good mornings,” “good afternoons,” nods and smiles that I received as I walked through my Over the Rhine neighborhood. Perhaps I am becoming accepted as part of the urban landscape. Or perhaps there was just something in the air.

Yesterday was National Night Out, and our local festivities were held at Findlay Market. Law enforcement arrived with police cruisers, a crime van, a horse mounted officer, bicycle riding officers, a D.A.R.E. vehicle and a fire engine from the Cincinnati police department, the Hamilton County sheriff’s office and the Cincinnati fire department.

The neighborhood turned out in force, families, kids, couples, singles, you-name-it. I enjoyed watching the kids climb on and around the fire engine, pet the horse and ask questions about him, and beg to borrow an officer’s bicycle “for a quick spin.” Even with something in the air, the answer to borrowing the bike was firm “no.”

I am not sure whether the neighbors visited for the education, the entertainment or the free dinner. When I turned my head to the food line, I saw T.O., the nominally full-time waiter at Tucker’s, manning the grill and in the weeds. The menu consisted of burgers and hot dogs from the grill, chips and pasta salad contributed by the Tucker family, plus soft drinks and bottled water. The food line was 20 deep; the guests were orderly and extremely polite. You see, there was something in the air, even if it was only the smell of grilling meat.

For the next 45 minutes or so, I helped T.O. at the grill, in charge of the hot dogs and putting burgers on buns. The line of guests never got shorter, but the tempers didn’t either. The grill was always packed with food, yet we barely kept pace. T.O. claimed this morning to have cooked 800 burgers and dogs in the two-plus hours of the party. I wouldn’t be surprised; the air was full of hungry, happy souls.

The most eye-opening part of my evening was T.O.’s running commentary on the people coming through our line — this transvestite hooker, that pimp, the other drug dealer all making nice to the cops, the absent father of many families, the inattentive mother, which kids were good citizens, which were already in trouble and those who were on their way there. Everyone was in such a congenial mood, it was almost easy to ignore the challenges that these people, these families, face every day — almost. Some things the air can only disguise.

Earlier in the day, as I do many days, I walked to and through downtown for a meeting there. As I passed the corner of Seventh and Walnut, I saw not the anonymous office building on the northwest corner; rather, I saw the imposing facade of the Schubert Theater that once inhabited that corner. Off and on throughout the afternoon, I reflected on the plays I attended in that space in the early and mid 1970s (for only a dollar or two a ticket) courtesy of a student program, the name of which I have long since forgotten, and of a girl who introduced me to the program.

As I left the Market mid-party, a song and a scene from one of those plays (that I am nearly certain I saw at the Schubert) popped into my head. I suppose that the sight of the neighborhood kids’ with few advantages gleefully playing at any opportunity reminded me in some way of Fagin’s gang in this scene. In any event, here is the scene from the glizty movie that I have never seen. My memory is of the lower production value, but higher energy, version of a touring company. As I said, it was something in the air.

(On another note, I just took a look at my LP copy (the big vinyl record with the little hole) of the original cast soundtrack from 1962. It contains a caution for those few listeners in stereo that voices may seem to move from side to side.)