It was a slow morning at Carman's. We made our nine-fifteen reservation with time to spare and were seated right away. Carman was manning the whole show, from setting the tables, to cooking the food, to collecting the tips. Her menu is different every week. She knows us by name. She knows all of her regular customers by name.
"Hi Brian, Hi Tom. What brings you out on a Thursday?"
We took our seats and graciously accepted cups of coffee. "I'm taking Brian to the airport."
"My sister gets married on Saturday, so I'm going home for the wedding. I'm Oklahoma bound."
"Oh, well, that sounds nice," Carman said. "Have you met the boy she's marrying?"
"Oh, yeah. They've been friends since middle school, so I've known him for years. He's a nice boy. They make a sweet couple."
"Well, that's good. How long are you staying?"
"Oh, a little more than a week. My spring break is coming up, so since it coincides with the wedding, I'm spending the time with my family."
She got a stern look on her face. "Oh, sweetheart. What are you going to do in the midwest for a whole week?"
Tom giggled mercilously. "Well, I'll visit my family and rest I guess."
"Yeah, there's not much to do there. I mean, don't get me wrong. It's a great place to grow our food, but they don't have any cities to speak of. The streets roll up at 6 and the whole place shuts down over night. And if you look in someone's back yard at their bar-b-que grill, you might be able to see someone, but other than that all the midwesterners hide in their houses."
"Well, Carman, you'll notice I don't live in the midwest anymore."
She laughed and ran into the kitchen to flip Tom's french toast and squeeze the blood oranges for the sauce to my pancakes.
She reemerged presently. "You know I'm from Indiana."
Tom looked incredulous. "You are?" he asked.
"Oh, yeah. But I've been in Philly for years. Anyway, the last time I was in the midwest was when my father died. He was a miserable cuss and deserved to die. German, Captain, bastard.
"Oh, we loved him, but you had to be one of us to love him. So I get a call from his nures who says he's dying and he wants to see you. So I say, let him die, and she says, no, he's holding on until all the kids get here.
"And that's just what he did. I got there and he dropped dead the next morning. He was waiting! He was waiting for all of us to show.
"So the night he died, I was in the room with him and I took a picture of the last breath, and a picture of him dead and then I closed his eyes and pulled out the IV and cables and the breathing thing and I sat across the room looking at him.
"About twenty minutes later a nurse came in and saw him not hooked up to anything and she looked at me like I did something wrong! Can you imagine! I told her, I said, 'I know a dead body when I see one. I can tell when they're dead and when they're not.'
"And then we had the funeral, and I guess my dad used to hang out at the Krogers produce department, because all these women showed up with Kroger's salads, salads that were just awful, by the way, pea potato salads and just awful stuff. But they showed up saying 'oh we just loved your father' and 'he was so kind' and I just couldn't believe it.
"I guess he was able to buffalo all those girls in the midwest. I guess it's a midwest thing. 'Cause he sure had all them girls fooled!"
She went back into the kitchen to check on our breakfast. Tom and I sat silently at our table, thinking about all she had said. "Carman?" I yelled in to the back. "Carman? Will you explain something to me?"
"Sure, hon."
"Did you just say that as your dad lay dying you snapped photos?"
"Don't you start, mister!"
Our breakfast was wonderful as always. On our way out, I got a Carman kiss. She wished me a safe journey.
Posted at 12:14 p.m.
previously on Sooner � next on Sooner
last five entries