Small Towns Never Change. Characters #4

(This is not the town in the post below.)

It was already 8:45 A.M. and the air was just starting to warm up.  I am normally an early riser, I was hungry...really hungry.  Since hubby is a big breakfast person the minute he gets up, whenever he gets up, he was verging on famished already.  We had to find food in this small Canada town which reminded me of the town I where I grew up.  There wasn't much here.  Train tracks along the outside edge, auto parts dealerships,  a hardware store, a real estate office, something called an 'underground galleria', another store with a sign 24 Hour Cash and a place that sold John Deere with John Deere toys in the window.  We did see a restaurant that advertised Chinese/Western food.  My stomach almost bolted.


Yes, there was a Dairy Queen (closed at this hour) and a MacDonalds...puleeze, I wanted food, not something to plug up my plumbing.  No pause for the challenges of travel when you are old.


We made a u-turn and did the whole town again finally finding a cross street with something that looked like a Tombstone version of Main Street.  I had read that Whifs Flapjack House was ranked as the #1 restaurant in town.  (Tabor, you aren't in Calgary anymore!)  We couldn't find that flapjack place, but as we cruised further down the quiet street we saw a restaurant with a few cars out front and a sign that said 'best bakery... something'.  Maybe we could get breakfast there?


Inside the restaurant of VERY SIMPLE decor (plastic chairs and tables and plastic flowers on a counter) was a small area the counter to the left and maybe six tables in a small open area on the right.  One table had four old-timers, 2 women and 2 men, sipping coffee and staring at each other.  As we entered, what little conversation they had been having ended, and they stared at us.  Clearly we were the break in Monday morning boredom they had been looking for.


Behind the counter was a chunky woman with a pony tail giving out change to another customer.  (I had the biggest deja-vu from when, as a teenager, I had worked two summers at Frank's cafe in my small hometown in Colorado...OMG I was going back in time and I had evolved and small towns had not and I wasn't all that comfortable about this revelation.)


The fact that no one talked and everyone watched our every move, made us even less comfortable.  We look questioning at the middle-aged woman behind the counter and she just stared back as well and then turned to the back wall to do something.


We walked up to the counter and studied the menu high on a board above her, at least to fill the uncomfortable void.  It listed a few pastries, a few sandwiches and drinks including something called "espresso."  Right!


When she turned back to face us, I asked what pastries she had.


"Just what is in that case behind you.  I have not had any time to bring anything up."  This was related in her best on-stage speaking voice so that everyone and anyone in the restaurant could hear.  


(Up?  From where?  Pastries from the cellar?  Fresh pastries from the former wine storage room?  More likely there was a former coal mine below.)


I saw a few sad rolls, two muffins and a cinnamon bun in the old fashioned case.  I asked for the cinnamon bun and coffee.  She handed me a white mug and pointed to the coffee pots on the side near the door.  I poured a cup of something, not really caring what as I wanted to just sit down and disappear.  I tried to pour from the cream jug and it appeared to be empty.  I tried the milk jug.  "Sorry but it looks like both of these are empty." 


"Hon, you will have to wait, I am the only one here until noon."   The only other four customers were drinking coffee and also waiting...  She was really busy.


Hubby ordered the fried egg sandwich but made the mistake of asking for tea.   


"That is going to take some time, outa hot water right now."  We both looked at each other in concern and I retreated to the far table for two against the wall.  Hubby then asked if she had Earl Gray (!)  She looked at him and replied: "If you want me to look in the back you will have to wait. " He suggested he would drink whatever tea she had available and then joined me at the table. 


Finally one of the old-timers (yeah, they were the same age as me and hubby...so what?!) got tired of staring at us and returned my tentative smile and asked where we were from.  We told our little tale of coming to the badlands to take photos and maybe see the dinosaur museum.


The waitress behind the counter turned away from frying the egg and asked me if I wanted my bun heated, and I assume she meant the one I ordered for breakfast.  Knowing it was probably made last Friday and dry as toast, I said yes.


The old guy at the table turned to the waitress and asked her if the museum was open on Monday.  He wondered aloud if they were now on the winter schedule.  She looked up at him and I think she was thinking...either about what he said or whether she was going to throw the spatula at him.  He turned to the women sitting next to him and asked the same question.  She responded with a similar expression on her face.


As we waited the other one of the two women, dressed in a flower print dress and sweater that reminded me of what my grandmothers wore, stood up, and lifting a cell phone out of her purse, asked in a voice loud enough to be heard in the 'wine cellar' if she could get a bus ticket for mid-morning. (Was everyone in this town hard of hearing?)  The contact on the phone must have said 'yes', because she hung up and hugged the other women and said good-bye to the two men and headed out the door.  As she reached the door one of the men said something to her.  She turned and waddled back to the table and then around to where we sat and pulled a wheeled basket with a grocery sack inside from behind my chair and then headed back out the door as her companions stoically watched.


The waitress brought me my warmed cinnamon bun and I actually apologized (fully intimidated by her at this time) and said I could have come up to the counter and gotten it myself.


As the egg sandwich cooked and the water boiled the man at the table began to relate various places we should see while visiting their little town including their very interesting coal mine and its' museum and the homestead antique museum.  While these were probably very nice, we really just wanted to see the dinosaur bones.


I looked up as the waitress behind the counter picked up the phone and in her normal (loud) voice asked 'Betty' at the other end of the phone line if the dinosaur museum was open on Monday.  She listened and then hung up and turned to us and said 'Betty' would call back.  As luck would have it, during our gourmet breakfast we learned when Betty called back that the museum was indeed on winter hours and not open on Mondays.  But, by this time, we were beginning to get the 'rhythm' of this New York style of hospitality in a small town in the Badlands of Canada.