Ajé Cafe

At the corner of Clark and Wellington sits Ajé Cafe. I pronounce it 'Ah-HEH.' The lady working the counter answering the phone says 'Ah-JAY.' She's probably right because, you know, she works there and all. But I still say 'Ah-HEH.' Like Michael Jackson with seasonal allergies.

Ah-HEH-heh. Sniff.

It's a small, cozy place with old wooden floors, a couple couches by the window and a burlap sack hanging on the wall. The sack reads "PRODUCT OF EL SALVADOR" in bold, blocky letters. I think it used to hold coffee beans.

Ajé Cafe is my favorite weekend reading spot. I have many weekend reading spots. A red recliner. My bed. The bench off Broadway and Barry. This big rock next to a playground by the lake which is actually really comfy, but makes me look like a creeper so parents keep glancing uncomfortably in my direction while they watch their kids (Ah-HEH-heh). Ajé Cafe is my favorite though.

I go there for lunch every Saturday and Sunday. It's become a personal tradition. The lady working the counter answering the phone knows my order by now.

"The usual?" she asks without looking up.

"The usual." I respond.

'The usual' is a Downtown Club on multi-grain with extra avocado and a side of fruit salad.

I like having a restaurant ask if I want 'the usual.' It makes me feel like we're spies speaking in code to evade the authorities. Lunch is a clandestine operation.

When I hand her a ten dollar bill, she hands me back twenty-eight cents. A quarter and three pennies, all of which I deposit into the tip jar. A sandwich at Ajé Cafe is not cheap. But it is worth it.

I move to my favorite table. There are only ten tables at Ajé Cafe, most only able to accommodate two people. I sit at the first one next to the window. It is my favorite reading table at my favorite reading spot. It is my favorite table because I can prop my feet up on the corner of one of the couches. Rude? Sure. But it's rude and comfortable. The lady working the counter answering the phone doesn't seem to mind. When you're here, you're family.

Once I'm seated, I open whatever book it is that I'm currently reading. Last weekend, it was Jack Kerouac's Dharma Bums. The book made me sad. Because I want to be Jack Kerouac. I think everyone wants to be Jack Kerouac. Except Jack Kerouac. He wants to be Gary Snyder. We all want to be anyone but ourselves. We all want to be anywhere but here.

The sandwich is ok. I mean, it's not terrible, otherwise I wouldn't spend $10 there twice a week. The bread is toasted, but still maintains a palatable softness to it. The ham and cheese slices are Communion wafer-thin. The veggies are fresh and the bacon is crisp. Honestly, it's like any other club sandwich you can get at most places. 3 stars on Yelp.

But there's something special about eating 'the usual' at my favorite table in my favorite reading spot. It opens up a portal. A wormhole to the past. Not literally though. That would be weird.

When I eat that specific sandwich at that specific table in that specific restaurant, the mixture of taste, smell, lighting and general atmosphere take me back to when I was seven. My mom, sister and I were living in a small one-bedroom apartment in Northwest Houston. There were stacks of books all over the place. On tables, chairs, couches, beds, floors. I think there were even a few in the potted plant. Frog and Toad. The Berenstain Bears. Amelia Bedelia. I read more books then than I do now.

During the weekends, after watching my morning cartoons, I would grab a couple and read them at the table. Around lunchtime, my mom would make me a grilled ham-and-cheese. I devoured the sandwich while devouring books (not literally though). It was the height of cuisine for those in the second grade.

The bread was toasted, but still maintained a palatable softness to it. The ham and cheese slices were Communion wafer-thin. There were no veggies because no seven-year old likes vegetables.

A second-grader doesn't have many problems in life, but the few that I had melted away on the weekends. There was nothing to worry about, nothing else to focus on. No quizzes, no bullies, no gym. It was just me, my book and my sandwich. All was right in the world.

I feel a similar sense of contentedness at Ajé Cafe. Even though I have supposedly bigger problems to deal with, they melt away when I eat my sandwich and read my book. I'm back on Emnora Lane, unit 2B of Hunter's Chase Apartments. My sister is in the living room, playing with her Barbies and my mother's in the kitchen on the phone, talking to my grandma. I am content. I am happy. I am where I need to be and nothing else matters.

Everything tastes better when sprinkled with nostalgia.