Euro Trashy

My Euro Trash neighbors have moved and I am missing them. Gone are my dashing prince of the cosmetics counter and his orange-haired Viking boyfriend. They were lured away by Emeryville which, admittedly, has a lot going for it: the best 3-D theater in The Beast; a humming foodie scene; Grayson’s, home of the best hamburger you will ever eat; the Berkeley Bowl; Rudy’s Can’t Fail; Pixar, Novartis, Bayer; Pete’s; and, in short, all kinds of people doin’ all kinds of stuff.
.
Jack London still has: The Chop Bar (home of the second best hamburger you will ever eat); Blue Bottle; Heinhold’s; a gorgeous water front; a great Chinatown just under the freeway; and the most happening summer festivals of the entire Bay Area, so I’m good. Brown Sugar Kitchen sits halfway between Emeryville and the Square so we can both score the BSK for our side. Did you know that Emeryville’s urban nickname is Rotten Town? It’s built on a superfund so huge that it is the bedrock of both Jack London Square and Emeryville. So it’s true, they didn’t move far but the psychic distance is enormous and I am feeling it today.
.
I miss seeing Matt (Mathias) taking his little dog for walks in the morning. King is a Pomeranian half-breed the size and texture of an orange coconut. I swear he was sired by a miniature orangutan. His hair is as orange as . . . well, Matt’s. They have exactly the same hair color—part of their inexhaustible charm. Matt will be old enough by the time King shuffles off this mortal coil that, given the ebbing of his hair line, he can skin the dog and put the pelt to good use on the dome; maybe even leave the head on, Davey Crockett style.
.
Daniel, or Danielle when she is fully tricked out, is a different kind of miss. Despite being a biological male, Danielle was a great girlfriend to have next door, often stopping by with a new perfume to show me or a little gift from the cosmetics counter—a mask, facial scrub, elbow cream, foot cream, lip cream, eye cream, hand cream, all the many, many creams it takes to keep me from spontaneously combusting during any of the hundreds of static shocks the winter months deliver.
.
She also did things that made me insane. She simply had to trump me when I invited them over for dinner. I would work most of the afternoon and evening to make something rather nice, ossobuco, for example, and to lay out a nice table with a great pairing of wine for each course. At the appointed hour, as I would be lighting the candles, Danielle and Matt would arrive with some crazy concoction Danielle had just dreamed up—waffles Rockefeller or a flaming dessert of peaches and whipped cream, and insist that we eat her dish for dinner.
.
It surprised me the first time. Maddened me the second. And infuriated me subsequently. She did not see the problem—I am bringing a wonderful surprise, she would claim, special, just for you because I love you. Failing to make my point, I failed to make them another dinner of any more complexity or work than sandwiches knowing they likely would arrive with a ziggurat of tapioca studded with mangoes, the entire thing burning like a gas leak mated to a cigarette.
.
But she would also be the one who would unfailingly call to ask how an important meeting had gone. Did I get what I wanted? If yes, she would run over with a bottle of wine. If no, she would give me a foot rub and tell me stories about growing up in Europe under the Communists.
.
Her stories made me happy. A well-told story is an experience so precious, a skill so rare, a thing of such beauty. Listen. How devilishly smart they had to be to survive the insanity of Communism and the state controlled markets that routinely meant there was no food, no raw materials, no capital, and no hope. I’m sure it was horrible, but she made it sound like a fun game tricking bureaucrats and bending rules and getting away with murder until you were caught and then murder got away with you.

Love my Neighborhood Bookstore