diner to go, regular.

Thirty-odd years later I again leave all these things behind me as I slide into the booth at the corner diner. The bustling white-shirted waiter approaches, carrying a menu beneath his arm.

“Y’wunna see manu?”

“Yeah, and gimme some coffee too, willya?”

“One coffee, righ’ back sir”

Busboy runs dampened rag across the table, sets out precisely one napkin, one fork, one knife. The spoons come later. Like right here with my coffee and the little creamer containers. Both of them thimble sized.

“Uh yeah, I gonna need s’more of these creamers, boss.”

“No problem, I bring them to you. So y’redy to ordeh now?”

“Nah, gimme a few minutes, and lemme get some water too alright?”

“The boy, he bring it now”

“Oh, alright, thanks buddy”

“I be right back for your ordeh”

“yeah.”

Now the statement: “I’ll be right back for your order”, does not have the same significance in Elyria, Ohio (name pulled randomly out of my skull. I was in Elyria once, at the Greyhound Bus Station with a traveling buddy. Between us we had about $14.39, and we still had to get up to Michigan and then – I apologize. Another story for another time) as it does in a New York City Diner. I knew I had ample time to decide while my waiter went out for a smoke in front.

I look around the place, not having been here for years. Comparing what I now see with my childhood memories. We brought my grandmother here for Easter Dinner once. It might have been the last Easter we all spent together. As I ponder these morbidities and sip my coffee, I begin to notice the memorabilia on the walls. Autographed pictures take up most of the available wall space. I notice they are all of the cast of the television comedy, Seinfeld. There only being four central characters to that comic ensemble, there’s a lot of pictures of a very few people.

And now I realize. The corner diner, which was once a safe refuge for me in troubled boyhood times had gone on to become the featured neighborhood diner on Seinfeld. Not quite knowing what to make of this connection, I simply intone a quick hope that the diner served them as well has it had me.

I open the menu. As is typical for establishments such as this, it is the size of a telephone book. It is one of the great mysteries of the City: How can a modest diner with an even more modest kitchen offer up almost every dish ever invented, from any cuisine, internationally. If you can’t get it at a New York greek diner, it don’t exist.

Daunted by the immensity of the menu, I glance around to the other tables. Perhaps I’ll see something appetizing and have my decision made by proxy. Around me are planted small groups of Columbia University students, a smattering of post-grads, a family showing their High School Senior daughter around a prospective school. OK, no help there, so its back to the menu.

I can feel the clock ticking now, my friend the waiter will return soon, if I miss him I may well starve. I look to the specials for inspiration, eyes scanning desperately. Soup d’Jour – cream of celery. Actually, that might work. Diner soup is usually a safe bet. I glance up, my friend the waiter is working his way down the aisle. Then I see it on the page, on its own little card:

“Hungarian Beef Goulash over noodles……….8.95”

The opportunity of this moment hits me like a ton of bricks. Or like a plate of Goulash, as the case may be. No one in this restaurant, most of the staff included, would EVER order the Goulash. Jerry not only would steer clear of the Goulash, but he would have a couple of dry, witty remarks to punctuate his distaste. Elaine, eating Goulash? No, thats like some weird fetishist's obsession. Forget about it. George? No, he’d probably had some childhood nightmare with Goulash. But Kramer, Kramer would likely have lobbied to have it put on the menu in the first place. And frankly, that’s more than enough reason for me.

“you reddy to ordeh now?”

“yeah, gimme a bowl of the celery soup, and the Goulash”

My friend the waiter leans in closer, squinting slightly.

“eh, wut wuzzat?”

“A bowl of cele-“

“No no no I got that par’..after that”

“The Goulash?” I suggest, sincerely trying to help my friend the waiter understand.

“You like the Goulash?” he eyes me skeptically.

“Is it good Goulash?”, I ask.

My friend the waiter smiles wide.

“Of course! It is the best Goulash. We make it special!”

He points down to the menu in my hands, to the index card slipped into a plastic sleeve. Across the top is printed “Wednesday Special”, and that is proof positive of how special this Goulash is.

The soup was delicious. The kind of soup where you sort of scrape around in the bottom of the bowl with your spoon even though its really quite empty. If I were at home, I’d run my finger around the inside of the bowl. It is that kind of good.

When the Goulash arrives, my friend the waiter produces the platter with a flourish.

“Very Nice!” he says to me.

And indeed it is a comely Goulash. I would go so far as to say that in the dictionary under “Hungarian Goulash over Noodles” one would find a picture of this very plate before me.

So I sit and eat, staring out onto Broadway as that Great Avenue descends into twilight and the City puts on her jewels for the night. Occasionally I am blinded by flash bulbs from the tourists who take pictures of each other in front of the Diner because it was featured in Seinfeld. It is also the inspiration of the Suzanne Vega song, “Joe’s Diner”, an insanely catchy little acapella ditty quite popular in the late eighties….Doo Doo Doo, Doo Doo DooDoo…. Sorry, it takes me a little while to drum the damn song out of my head once it starts. You go listen to the song and see how well you fare, uh-huh.

The tourists peer through the windows, as if actually expecting to catch a glimpse of their favorite stars. One cups her hands on the window directly before me, all the better to peer intently over me while I try to eat the Special Goulash my friend the waiter has brought me. I half rise from my seat, lean into the glass right up to her face and I snarl at her, my eyes flashing malice barely constrained. She beats a quick departure and I am left to finish my Goulash in peace.

Although I confess I didn’t actually finish it. It got a bit heavy on the stomach. And the noodles were too thin. They should have used the wide egg noodles. In New York, everyone’s a critic. You name the field or area of endeavor, and every last one of us New Yorkers has the brass and just enough information to tear it to shreds. We murder the things we love, and so are content here. For proof of my assertion, I offer up to you The New York Mets. Quod Erat Demonstrandum.

I sit and drink another coffee while I wait for the check. Somehow this culinary experience with the Goulash has reconciled my past with my present. I was bitter that such publicity and fame should intrude on a place with which I had very special and personal memories. It felt like a crass intrusion to me. But this is, after all, New York. Keep moving, we gotta go. So I leave a generous tip for my friend the waiter, pay my tab up front, and step out into the nighttime of Broadway. I smile, her beat already drumming up through my soles. As I cross the street, heading downtown, I don’t even cast a glance up 112^th Street. I don’t have to. The woman who I called grandma is part of me. And somehow I think she’d rather be strolling down Broadway window-shopping in the twilight, than brooding over an ugly building.

And so I window-shop as I stroll downtown, taking care to keep an eye out for something she might have liked.