The Final Night of Smog Cutter

I stepped out of work and texted Lena not to wait up. I was walking home and I wanted to take my time. She was OK with that cause she knew me. Some people at work knew I walked home and they were always shocked. Los Angeles ain’t that kind of city for most. On the other hand, they were the kind of people that would be shocked at stuff like that. To be honest, I was kind of shocked at how easy it was to shock West Coast people. Or maybe it was all for show. I was still figuring it out, I guess. But I think I kinda knew.

I walked on well-lit streets and walked down dark alleys both. I had my headphones in but I turned off the music when I was in the alleys. An old trick.

No one bothered me. It was only Silver Lake.

I got onto Virgil and next thing I knew I was coming up on good ol’ Smog Cutter. I figured, fuck it, I’ll stop in for one.

Mostly just the usual suspects. I shook hands with the four playing pool. An older Thai lady was sitting on a stool and she let me kiss her on the cheek. The Thai bartender with the heavy mascara and red lipstick had my Coors on the counter before I sat down and I leaned over the counter and kissed her on the cheek too. I looked over to the karaoke DJ. A young white dude. He was beginning a song. I’d never once seen him before.

“The hell is this?” I said.

No one could hear me. He was singing some Elton John. He wasn’t bad.

There was a shot of whiskey with my beer. I took that and put some money on the counter. She already knew to keep it. She seemed a little sullen.

“Mama,” I said.

She leaned over.

“Everything OK?”

“This our last week.”

“To do what?”

“We close.”

“What do you mean close?”

“Bar is bought. Next Sunday our last day.”

The news crushed me. I didn’t know what to say. I looked back on the karaoke DJ with anger. But I knew he wasn’t to blame. But wasn’t he? But wasn’t I?

The whole neighborhood was going up and it wasn’t the first or even the second time I’d seen this happen. Every city I moved to, to wherever neighborhood where it felt good, where it felt right, this was happening. Most days I knew this was some kind of cycle of life, had to accept this as an adult. It was easy to blame gentrification on white people. Everything, these days, is easy to blame on white people. Also, it feels good to blame it on white people. Even white people like blaming it on white people. But then, how could I explain myself being present for every one of these turning of the tides? I’m not white, so that was one way to excuse myself. But could I be here, making a living, affording what I could afford, if there wasn’t the opportunity that I hate to admit gentrification provides? The change of the neighborhoods, the arrival of fancy restaurants and coffee shops and gastropubs? Isn’t this exactly what had allowed me to move around the country and simultaneously pay off my student loans to Sallie Mae?

I was still fucking sad. The whole thing was sad.

I sat there being sad, drinking my beer, and ignoring the singing DJ. Mama saw me and asked, “Are you hungry?”

I wasn’t but I said I was anyway. She turned her back to me and when she turned around she had a plate full of food. I lifted a chicken thigh from the plate and took a bite. It was cold but it was still really good. Spicy and still crisp. I ate everything on the plate with a hidden hunger. I don’t think I looked up from the plate once.

“Want more?”

“Yes. And another beer too, please,” I said.

I looked at the pictures on the wall. They looked like the kind of pictures you get developed at a Walgreen’s. Then, you take them home and post them on your walls. Maybe even draw some dicks next to a mouth or something. Then, you go to class. Except these were all grown ups. I was a grown up now. Sometimes I even acted like one.

I thanked Mama profusely for the food, finished my second beer, and left.

I still had at least another twenty minutes of walking before I got home. For some reason, I was still hungry. Not starving. But just wanted more. I stopped by a Mexican spot that stayed open late. The light in the place was obnoxiously bright but they had great mirrors and besides, a place like that, trust me, you need to keep the lights bright. This stretch of blocks was the kind of neighborhood someone would sleep on your living room floor if you left your door open.

I ordered some carnitas tacos and sat down and waited while they made them. As I waited, some ladies walked in. A bit older than me, late thirties or early forties, maybe older and they just put it on well. They were all dressed to the nines. Nice flower patterns and high heels and their hair done nice. Lipstick on and they were excited to be there, to be out in the world. It made me feel happy and sad at the same time.

I don’t remember eating the tacos when I got home. It wasn’t important. That place would be around. Or would it? I guess I didn’t know anymore.

Sunday came, the final night of Smog Cutter, and a friend who knew of my love of the dive texted me, saying he read it was closing in the LA Weekly. I looked it up and it was true. I didn’t read the article. I didn’t want to. I didn’t know why the hell that would get printed. Like they cared about some dive on the outskirts of Thai Town/ Silver Lake/ Koreatown. But it was public knowledge now. The bar was closing and the last night was tonight. So we planned to go.

A lot of people had heard me talk about this place and they wanted to get their last chance to see what it was about. We were all gonna meet there. Leia was the first to tell me there was a line to get in. I think I said something like what the fuck?

I knew the place got packed on the weekends but a line? Unless it’s a rollercoaster, the airport, or the DMV, I was at a point in my life where I was over standing in lines. But I had to show up. And indeed, there was a line. But Leia was already at the front of it. So my friend and I hopped in with her. There was a doorman. Some dude that was a cowboy or a fire fighter or something. Another guy I’d never seen there before. He didn’t seem to have any idea of what he was doing but he seemed determined to try. When we got in, we could barely get to the bar. In fact, we never did. The three of us looked at each other and we all had the same face.

But more than that, I was thinking to myself, where the hell have these people been all this time? So many people, I can’t even see Mama behind the bar. And while I was glad they were making some good cash before the lights turned out that final evening, I wondered that this couldn’t have been the way they wanted it to end. It’s not how I would’ve wanted it. Surrounded by strangers and working my ass off with a bunch of people saying over and over again, “I can’t believe this place is really closing.” Some joker I’d never seen before, saying that. I know I didn’t want that because I’d already had it before. I didn’t like it the first time. It wasn’t a good feeling. All that money I made those final nights, all that money is gone. And that place is gone too. All I have left is the memory. And I think, for some reason, I’m making the memory, in my mind, a better thing than the reality of it was. Funny how that works.

Nostalgia is a trap.

We got out of that place. I felt bad. I didn’t even get to say goodbye to Mama or any of the guys who played pool or the chubby Thai karaoke DJ who was always wasted out of his mind and his violent drunk girlfriend. I hoped I’d run into them in a grocery store or something.

We took it back to my place. We listened to music and talked about the world and I made old fashioneds. Everyone woke up the next day in their own beds and we texted back and forth things like holy shit and I feel awful and man what a fun night. We didn’t get to spend the last night of Smog Cutter under its roof, but I think we had some of the idea with us. We had the memory with us.