Coffee Shop Memories

This column originally appeared on Sunday, Feb. 24, 2008

Friday morning brought just enough snow to make you think there wasn’t really a need to rush to work, so you might as well stop in at Penn’s Table for some breakfast.

When I walked in from the cold it was clear I wasn’t the only one with that idea, but there was still space at the counter. I sat down a few stools away from a middle-aged man and his granddaughter, who was having the pancakes that vaguely resemble Mickey Mouse without the copyright symbol. She looked me over to make sure I wasn’t trying to swipe the syrup, and flashed me a friendly smile after I waved hello.

After a few minutes, Anthony came over to say hello to her and banter with her grandfather. Anthony and his wife Jenn own the place, have for years, and treat the people who come in on a regular basis pretty much like you would if one of your neighbors was sitting at your kitchen table, wondering if he could get extra chips and pickles with his BLT.

Anthony went about teasing the young girl, maybe 5 years old, maybe 6, about how much she’d eaten and how fast and I suddenly remembered another snowy day when I sat at a coffee shop counter and listened to the owner tease a young kid as he topped off a cup of hot chocolate with a spray of whipped cream.

The kid was me, of course, and the owner was a Greek guy named Nick, inconceivably, and the coffee shop was the one my father stopped off at to read the paper on his way to the University of Cincinnati, where he taught chemistry. On some Saturday mornings he would take my sisters and I there for a breakfast treat, and Nick and the grey-haired haired waitress who ran the counter would make us feel at home.

It is among the treasures of childhood to have an adult in a position of such high authority – owner of a coffee shop -- recognize that you are important enough to come over and gently suggest that your haircut looks a trifle silly and maybe you just ought to keep your wool cap on all day. It is even better, though, to have the waitress let you come around behind the counter and grab a new spoon since you dropped the other on the floor and have concerns about the germs.

But this column isn’t just about coffee shop owners named Anthony or Nick. It’s about the misgiving that nestles in your stomach when you see a franchise eatery open its doors down the street from the family-owned place you always go to. It’s about how those glittery national chains slowly erode the ability of the local joints to compete, and how little by little we end up all getting the same food at the same price in the same space served by people wearing the same clothes, whether we like it or not.

You might have seen some of those places open up recently in West Chester. I am not suggesting in any way that what they’re offering isn’t tasty, well presented, and sometimes more comestible than a cup of two-day-old chili at the local diner. But I think it bears noting that when Serbian crowds in Belgrade last week decided to attack the evils they associated with America, they chose a McDonalds.

And I’ll have a little more whipped cream with my cocoa, Anthony. Thanks.