Baked In Seattle

by Shaw Sander

  Piercing high-decibel noise plummeted sales, heavy machinery covered the trendy new café with relentless dust then all the work stopped completely, leaving equipment and trucks full of pipe, huge dunes of sand by the front door and twisted, exposed rebar sticking out of the ground. Two weeks of inactivity went by, then three.

  Cora was desperate. Her rent was due and because she hadn’t been paid, she had to sell her air conditioner. The owner, Nunzio, was a second-generation Sicilian gay man and his life savings was at stake. When the work simply sat undone, it drove Nunzy nearly mad and almost out of business. Calls to City Hall were getting him nowhere.

  I suddenly knew what to do, writing to Mike Royko on behalf of Cora. Taking a bit of liberty, I presented myself as Cora.

  “Mr. Mike Royko

  Chicago Tribune

  Chicago, Illinois

  August 6, 1984

  Dear Mr. Royko;

  For the first time, I can honestly say that I love my job. I am very good at the work I do.

  Directly outside my workplace sprawls a problem that is threatening not only my job but the entire flow of commerce from Aldine to Waveland along north Broadway. Fired up by a shared-grievance session with the proprietor of the resale shop next door, I called CBS to speak to Walter Jacobson; Mr. Jacobson's assistant referred me tiredly to my alderman, saying he’d already heard from businesses on our street and he couldn’t do anything. Jerry Orbach was not in; his assistant said he’d look into it and call me back in an hour, mispronouncing my name. An hour later, he left a message for me----"Thursday."

  I, for one, have my doubts that we'll have a new sidewalk by Thursday. I've heard this line before. If you can do anything about this cul-de-sac of non-responsibility, I would greatly appreciate it; let me tell you a sad story.

  My occupation is unusual in that I am a woman in food service. The dues I have paid amount to ten years in some of the Chicago-area's finest restaurants. Working my way up from prep, or assistant to the chef or cook, I recently left a secure, well-paid but physically exhausting head cook-kitchen coordinator position after 2 grinding years. To prepare food for a restaurant that seated 98, open from lunch to midnight dinner and weekend brunches 363 days a year---a popular, prosperous Lincoln Park restaurant—left me with biceps that rival a woman wrestler, burn and cut scars, and a permanently damaged wrist, "carpal tunnel syndrome," or chef's wrist. Worn thin, I had thought it was time for a total career change, out of food service altogether. But when I interviewed for this cafe position, the owner gesturing grandly at the future finished product, sawdust and drywall everywhere-- my gut feeling was "Go for it."

  Nunzio Cafe e Galleria was inspired by a tour of Toronto the owner Nunzio once took. Pretty little sidewalk cafes beckoned to him everywhere. Borrowing from his parents and a few trusting friends, Nunzio designed a menu with some of his mother's treasured Sicilian recipes, contracted artists to exhibit monthly in the cafe, painted, scraped, wired, plumbed, and constructed to meet Health Department regulations. He bought quality used kitchen and dining room equipment, light fixtures, deco knick-knacks, fifties cabinets, a green and pink neon clock, vases, an espresso machine. The health inspector rated the cafe 99 out of 100---he said he'd give it a hundred, but that'd look suspicious downtown. All the proper licenses went up on the wall.

  Nunzio is a small businessperson struggling toward the American Dream. Second-generation Sicilian, he comes from a blue-collar Detroit family. His folks visit every other month, staying four or five days, helping out, his father fixing the freezer compressor while his mother does dishes and runs to the store. They're very proud of their son. I took their picture on opening day as our first customers.

  The cafe is four blocks from my apartment, my hours are flexible, I am well-paid for the time I put in, the work crew is capable and interesting, and the creative challenge of menu specials and new desserts keeps me enthused and eager to work—like I say, I love my job. What Mama Fresta didn't teach me from her personal collection of tested recipes, I cull from memory, experimental urges, one of many cookbooks or a magazine for the culinary arts. Since the café only seats twenty-five, my workload is no greater than feeding an enormous extended family. I am considerably healthier, happier and constantly updated with both praise and constructive criticism from our friendly customers.

  By the time the cafe opened in April, there was no money left to advertise. A large, transplanted community from Detroit, Nunzio's friends and fellow business owners along Broadway, my friends and hungry following, and the attractive, bright, wild atmosphere of the cafe itself drew a good deal of business. An underground grapevine sent us a late-night crowd of punkers, gay men and women, and young people who found ours to be a new hot spot. A more conservatively attired crowd enjoyed early evening dinner. Things looked great for the future of the cafe; we were gaining neighborhood celebrity status and so my job was secure.

  On July 1st, a street crew materialized and tore up the sidewalk in front of us with a jackhammer and a bulldozer. No Parking signs went up on every meter for blocks, concrete tubes and metal rods appeared in piles, dump trucks and enormous, noisy equipment multiplying daily.

  "Better get used to it," Nunzio groaned. "It'll be like this for at least two weeks, they said."

  The Broadway business hotline from Buckingham to Addison buzzed the information down our way. It was our only source of real information and commiseration.

  We battened down the hatches and held on, kept the door shut to keep out dust storms that rivaled a big Okie blow, turned on the air conditioner for ventilation and blared the radio to block out the unbearable noise level. Tremors from the heavy machinery shook down two of the plastic letters over the door, shattering then on a table before they hit the floor. Nunzio patiently re-glued the hand-designed and-cut logo pieces and remounted them. They fell again, three days later, under the heavy artillery attacks.

  Then suddenly one day the trucks were gone. Our sandpit for a sidewalk remained untouched. Bumpy cement pieces jutted out of the dirt, rusted wires an inch around snaked dangerously out of the ground. Two weeks had gone by and nothing was anywhere near completion. Mounds of leftovers blocked traffic, just sitting there. All the activity had shifted to the south; Nunzio asked around and found there were hurrying it up down further south for the upcoming Broadway Street Fair. And it would be at least another week before we got our sidewalk or street back.

  Needless to say, business dwindled then plummeted to nearly nothing. There would be one, maybe two hours of work for me to do. I began worrying about my rent, my American Express bill.

  The cafe's skeleton crew began taking all their meals at the restaurant, there being no cash available.

  Nunzio began talking about getting a waiter job. He started sweating the rent, the gas bill, my salary. Our hardcore customers still wandered in for a meal now and then but it couldn't cover the overhead. Even Nunzio's catchy idea of spreading Oriental rugs across our sand-bar, placing two plants on either side of the door “for the total Sahara effect" did not help.

  "Tuesday," Nunzio reported last Saturday as the word spread. Tuesday came and went. No Parking. No road crew. No sidewalk.

  I paid my rent this month by selling my air conditioner. And I got an additional jab to supplement my meager income from the cafe, my first priority. But that job doesn't start until September.

  The alderman's assistant told me that Miller Asphalt Co., hired to re-do the street, is not responsible for the sidewalk. The sidewalk contractor ("Some Italian company") went bankrupt, and their crew walked off the job for non-payment of wages due. I don't blame them for walking, that's a helluva good reason. But for some reason, a Lakeview organization hired the private contractors and this makes the city also not responsible since they didn't directly order the work done. Or that's what the aldermanic aide said. He promised a sidewalk by Thursday. I think he was trying to pacify me. "Try Streets and San," he told me.

  Yesterday, outside the cafe, two elderly ladies
struggled across the sandpit one with an armload of groceries.

  "Do you think they'll ever finish this?" I heard one remark.

  "Not in our lifetime," came the reply. I'm starting to feel the same.

  Isn't there something I can do?”

  I signed Cora’s name, sent it off and hoped for the best.

  The fact-checker at the Chicago Tribune called Nunzio three days later to confirm that yes, he had actually spread an Oriental runner across the sand dune outside the restaurant door and added a palm tree “for the full Sahara effect,” and yes, his chef had sold her air conditioner to pay the rent. He assured her that yes, his parents spoke little English and the restaurant had been their life’s dream. Bewildered, Nunzio wondered why Mike Royko’s office had taken an interest in him but he shrugged it off, too panicked about going under.

  Next day, just in time for the week’s restaurant reviews, Mike Royko wrote a nice piece about Nunzio’s café, taking the city to task for dashing the poor immigrant’s dream and demanding immediate action.

  “Chicago Tribune, Friday, August 17, 1984

  Pasta a la dusta just doesn't sell

  THE QUESTION keeps coming up: Is Chicago

  the city that works?

  It depends on whom you ask. If you are from

  City Hall, don't even bother to ask Nunzio Fresta.

  Nunzio is a small businessman. A few months

  ago, he opened an Italian-style cafe on Broadway

  near Addison. It's a pleasant little place. A dozen round

  tables. Original art on the walls. A limited but

  interesting menu. Not meant to be a full-service

  dining room, it's patterned after European

  sidewalk cafes. Business was pretty good in the beginning.

  Then came progress. And disaster.

  The city recently began tearing up that stretch

  of Broadway. It's part of a program to rebuild

  some streets and sidewalks that are in bad shape.

  ON JULY 1, A crew showed up in front of the

  restaurant and tore up the sidewalk.

  "We better get used to it," Nunzio told his chef

  and waitress. "They say it might be as much as

  two weeks before the new sidewalk is in."

  Naturally, business dropped off. With the sidewalk

  and part of the street torn up, the

  slightest breeze created a dust storm. There were

  mounds of rubble and no place to park.

  The two weeks passed. No new sidewalk appeared.

  And the sidewalk work crew had disappeared.

  Nunzio tried to find out what was going on with

  his sidewalk. But nobody could tell him.

  He called City Hall and got the runaround. He asked

  the remaining workmen, but they were vague.

  And every day, business got worse and worse.

  "We lost our lunch business. And some nights we

  only had two people for dinner. I couldn't pay the

  help. My cook had to sell her air conditioner to

  pay her rent."

  WORSE. NUNZIO couldn't get any answers. He

  had no idea when—if ever—the sidewalk would be

  replaced so customers could come in without tripping

  over rubble or gasping on dust. Nunzio asked if we could get

  some answers for him, and here they are. The contractor for

  the Broadway project said the problem was caused by the

  subcontractor who was responsible for sidewalk work.

  "The city now requires that all general contractors,

  such as myself, must give about 25 percent of the subcontracts to

  minority businessmen," the contractor said.

  [This is a policy put in by Mayor Washington's

  administration. ]

  "Well, there aren't that many minority firms

  capable of doing the work. The first one I contacted is reliable,

  but he has more work than he can handle. So they recommended

  somebody and we took them.

  BUT THEY TURNED out to be under funded.

  They didn't have enough money to pay their workers.

  So when they couldn't meet their payroll, the workers walked off the job.

  "We funded him for a couple of weeks. We

  advanced him $2,500 a week. But they still couldn't meet their payroll.

  And that's why the sidewalk wasn't finished."

  The subcontractor said: "I took this job on the

  spur of the moment. I told them up front I didn't have the money

  to meet my payroll. They told me they'd handle it. Then the city advanced

  them money so they

  could advance me money. But then he told me he

  couldn't advance me anymore. So I didn't have

  any capital and I couldn't get a loan from the

  bank. So I couldn't pay my men and I couldn't do

  the sidewalk. I thought I could call downtown [City Hall]

  and get money. But it doesn't work that way."

  NO, THAT NORMALLY isn't the way it works.

  Usually, you have to do the work to get paid. But the city

  finally advanced enough money so that the subcontractor

  could pay his workers. And on Aug. 10, more than five weeks

  after the sidewalk was torn up, it was finally replaced.

  "It took them only one day to get the concrete

  poured," Nunzio said. "One day is all it took. And

  we had to spend five weeks waiting."

  Now they are beginning work on the other side of Broadway.

  And the same subcontractor will be doing the sidewalks.

  When told that, Ald. Jerry Orbach—who has

  been deluged with complaints from Broadway businessmen—gasped.

  "I was told by public works that the guy was bankrupt or something

  and they're getting another subcontractor."

  NO, HE'LL BE doing the rest of the work.

  "Well, if that guy's going to do the work, it's

  scary."

  Meanwhile, Nunzio doesn't know if his business

  will recover from the five-week slump. It's like

  starting over again, except he's spent all of his

  capital just trying to survive. And he can't call anybody

  in City Hall for an advance.”

  People had streamed to the restaurant in droves despite the hardship in negotiating the streets, eating everything Nunzy and Cora could turn out.

  Cora had fifty people ask her if she had really sold her air conditioner to pay her rent as they stuffed money in the front counter tip jar. Nunzy took Royko’s column to Sir Speedy and had it blown up onto foam board, leaving it easel-ed in the window.

  By Friday evening all the heavy equipment had smoothed a path to the restaurant’s door. By Tuesday the project was mysteriously, amazingly done, but alas, though she was grateful to me, Cora had stayed with the bully.

  “It makes me want to move to Canada!” Drake moaned, his anger and anxiety heightened with every administration blunder. “My stomach is grinding glass. Bush is such an idiot. I can’t believe I once thought he was handsome.”

  “You did?” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

  “Have you ever seen his college pictures, Al? He was a cheerleader in a white cable-knit sweater and those yummy pleat-front white pants. Took a wrong turn, that’s for sure. Now he’s all down-home yuck-yuck with that priss of a wife and leading us straight into hell with this war.”

  I knew what he meant and agreed but I took a longer view.

  “We all lived through the sixties and seventies with VietNam and Nixon when it also felt like the end of civilization. Things are cyclical and each generation thinks theirs is the crisis of all crises, much worse than any previous. It seems to me like we just kept repeating the same story.”

  “He’s going to blow us al
l to hell. I just know it. But enough about him. Back to me. Here’s my new idea. Why not heat whole buildings with computer equipment, Al? If they could harness this room alone we’d be able to light up Vashon Island. Honest to Val Kilmer’s ‘Gotham,’ how is a girl supposed to stay fresh as ‘National Velvet’ when these machines crank out so much hot air?”

  Drake was surrounded by a fax machine, a laptop, a desktop, a flat screen monitor, a copy machine, a printer and the entire security system’s five screens with my FedEx truck at the loading dock visible from his desk. He waved a hand-painted Japanese bamboo folding fan and intermittently patted his forehead with his light blue hanky, slipping it back in his jacket pocket at a perfect rakish angle.

  “It’s pouring outside,” I informed him then looked out the 40th floor window behind his desk. We were completely enclosed in a surreal grey cloud. “About fifty degrees. Wanna switch jobs?”

  “No, thank you, darling. Despite how hard it is on my complexion, I still prefer indoor civilization to your blue-collar underworld. And you get so dirty on your job. I might break a nail.”

  “How’s the kid from Portland?”

  “He’s sweet as a little puppy and thinks I’m to die for. I feel terrible.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s just so…young. He wears Converse All-Stars, AnnaLee, and has a MySpace page with pictures of his old dorm room on it. He teaches inner city youth and eats ramen noodles because it’s all he can afford and he’s happy. It’s not my scene. Good in bed but still. I can’t deal with it. Anyway,” Drake sniffed, waving his hands to push it all away. “I’m focused on my Teaching English classes and getting certified to get the hell out of this country. Not so much as a dust bunny ties me here and I could just as easily be teaching swarthy Aegean goat boys on some blue-water island. I’ll stick to having fun. I’ve got to leave before I go mad.”