Forty-three years ago, this place opened its doors with a gleaming coffee machine that cost us nearly everything and a neon sign that never once flickered through its first decade of operation.
Now that sign hums like it’s tired of the work.
The diner smells exactly the same as it has for decades: coffee, bacon grease, industrial-strength bleach, and something sweet and indefinable that I never quite learned to name. Pancake batter, probably. Cinnamon. Or perhaps just the particular scent of a place that consistently delivers on its promises—that feeds you, warms you up, gives you a booth by the window and a refill without requiring you to ask.
Last night I slept upstairs in the small apartment above the diner—the same apartment where my wife Joanne and I have lived since 1979. Same creaky wooden stairs leading up to it. Same bedroom with the window that looks out over Highway 20 and the parking lot, where on clear nights we could see the diner’s neon sign glowing against the darkness like a lighthouse meant specifically for travelers.
