Besides
the amusing characters I worked alongside, like Brenda ballerina, bartender
Jimmy, Joe “Mama” in the kitchen, the Ruskin family, and Richard Sanders, I
served many and various customers who were -- and are -- fairly well known.
The
artists and their families, for one: John Chamberlain, his son, Jesse, and
Jesse’s girlfriend, the drummer Jane Fire (from the Erasers); Lisa deKooning,
who came by very regularly. She wasn’t much of a conversationalist, but she
liked to drink.
Then
there were the musicians: Paul Butterfield, Joni Mitchell. Butterfield drank a good deal, but was
quiet and kind of sad. Joni
Mitchell was upbeat and smiled at me kindly, ordering a Molson Golden beer
while she practically chain-smoked her cigarettes and chatted with painter
Nathan Josephson.
One
night, at my large table in my server section, I waited on a very interesting
eight-top of artsy folk who included William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg (and
Peter Orlovsky, of course). You
best believe I was shakin’ in my boots that time. . . how could I not be
nervous, waiting on such big legends and their entourage (or their hangers-on
-- or is it hanger-ons)?
I
always looked like I kept my cool, though: I was working at One U, but most of
all, I was a New Yorker. You never blew your cool. Das
wast verboten. The song,
“Broken English,” punctuated the air with Marianne’s sweet ragged voice clawing
through the wreckage.
And
then, one night in February, two young guys came up to me, dressed in black
turtlenecks, with Ray-Bans (very Andy Warhol, I thought). They knew me from the NY club scene:
one guy was from the Invaders, and the other guy booked the Peppermint Lounge
and had a band called U.S. Ape.
I
figured they must be hungry and broke, so I brought them sodas and bread and
soup (all free). I wondered why
they weren’t that interested in eating. . . instead, they were into goofing
around and trying to get my attention by talking about how great my old band
was and how the guys used to line up to get in just to see Nervus Rex because a
cute girl -- me -- was in the band.
Is
there any wonder why I listened to them?
Compliments are the sweetest ambrosia. . . especially to one who was
dying of thirst.
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