My Reverie

During my grad school days at the University of San Francisco, I spent my nights behind the bar at Varni’s Roaring Twenties, a classy, energetic nightclub in the historic Jackson Square district.

Varni’s, housed in a Barbary Coast-era brick building was transformed to capture the ambiance of a 1920s speakeasy. We had a trad jazz band that played prohibition-era music. Clientele danced solo or as couples, to classic moves: The Charleston, The Black Bottom, The Shimmy, and The Texas Tommy.

The décor and the melodies paid homage to the Roaring Twenties; but, the cocktail waitresses' attire was at home in the 1960’s; fishnet stockings, miniskirts, daring necklines, and towering beehive hairdos.

There were two bars at The Roaring Twenties. At the Main Bar patrons could choose to sit on bar stools, stand holding their drinks, settle at tables or step on the dance floor and let it rip.

The other bar was smaller and tucked away. This “service bar” served as the spot where waitresses placed and collected drink orders for customers away from the main bar. There were only two stools, and they were more for décor than for seats.

There was no plastic payment in 1963. Transactions were all currency and coin. It’s impossible to estimate the number of steps the waitresses would have taken during their seven-hour shifts. There was a constant flow of orders, balancing tipsy drinks on flimsy trays, and handling money while being charming and sexy to earn indispensable tips. Their one-dollar-per-hour salaries would barely pay for the showy hairdos.

Mixing drinks at the service bar was much easier, and it paid better. I had to work fast, with no hesitant uncertainty about the recipes for more than seventy-five different cocktails, but the girls knew how to order and we worked together well. I was on salary - not dependent on unpredictable gratuities - and I got a twenty-minute break after three hours. All cocktail waitresses would have preferred my job, but at the time, under California law, women could not be bartenders – just waitresses.

I was working behind the service bar when a guy in a Brioni suit and a girl in a stunning v-neckline little black cocktail dress slid onto the bar stools. She wore pearl earrings with a silver choker. She set a stylish evening clutch on the bar as they settled in.

The guy said, “Two cognacs”. I set snifters in front of them and expertly poured one point-five ounce each of Courvoisier, while listening to an impatient waitress: “Two Rusty Nails, Sidecar, Manhattan”. The guy handed me a five. I rang up $2.10, and set his change on the bar, and turned toward the mirrored back bar to grab a bottle of Drambuie for the Rusty Nails.

That’s when I caught a reflection of loveliness with blue eyes, honey-colored skin, and an elegant light brown updo hairstyle. The room was filled with stunning women, but the one sitting at my bar made all the others disappear.

Waitresses were eager to get their orders filled and tips earned, so I had to stop enjoying the sneaky view and do my job. As I mixed and poured I heard an engaging female voice, “Ya’ll need a good mem‘ry and speedy hands for doin’ your job.”

I always acknowledged the not-from-here accents, and hers was pure South. As I poured gin and vermouth into an iced martini shaker, I asked, “So, where’d get that twang?” 

She answered with a surprised expression and a comically exaggerated drawl, “Yer the one who’s talkin’ funny.”

The guy she was with laughed and I laughed, too. As I filled another tray with drinks and turned to ring up the tab, I said, “So what are you two doing for a good time in this foggy city?”

“You mean, besides talkin’ with you?”

I answered, “Hey, that’s my good time. I’m asking about your good time.”

“Well, we just saw a songster at the Hungry i and she was amazing.”

A waitress interrupted, “Four marties; two over, one twisted. All down on ten.” Reaching for the gin and vermouth I heard the guy in the suit.

“Her name’s Barbra Streisand. Forty years from now, she’ll be considered the best female pop singer of the 20^th Century.”

 The girl responded, “You’ll have to excuse my brother. He has a hard ol’ time makin’ up his mind about things. He’s Travis, and I’m Susan, by the way.”

She could have added, “…and I’m the most amazing woman you’re gonna meet in your lifetime.” I would have agreed like a bobblehead - her brother?!

When my relief showed up, I came around and continued our conversation from their side of the bar. The music and the human hum were thunderous so I stood more closely than I would have in quieter circumstances. Streisand was the hottest ticket in the city. I imagined being in the audience with Susan as my date. Dream on.

Travis said they stopped by Varni’s because they liked to dance, but the floor was too jammed so they were on their way to see the Miles Davis Quartet at Basin Street West. I told them how to get there, just a short, very steep, walk up Montgomery to Broadway. We talked about music, and I thought I was holding my own while sniffing whiffs of intoxicating perfume and feeling puffs of Susan’s laughter against my cheek. She filled my eyes, my ears, and my imagination. What did she think I was thinking? Or did she even wonder, or care?

As the conversation continued, it became clear that Travis and their father planned to attend a business/dinner meeting the next night. Susan was not invited. (“No women, you know”).

She was bitter about being excluded from a discussion that effected family investments; however, it was a man’s world and she was relegated to a hotel room, alone and a thousand miles from home.

I said, "I'm off tomorrow. Would you spend the time with me over dinner and conversation at your hotel?"

Their startled expressions reminded me that this proposal was not exactly appropriate. Yikes. I wished I could push a reset button. It was 1963. Strange bartenders in strange cities were just as off-limits for young women as business meetings were; maybe even more so.

Travis’ eyebrows went up. I was sure my presumption was about to be rebuffed - hopefully in a polite way. But that's not what happened. Susan looked at her brother with her chin raised. Then she looked back at me and said, “I'm staying at the St. Francis - room 721. Call me from the desk, OK? What time?”

I’m flopped down in my TV chair with my eyes closed. I hear quiet laughter, a jumble of shared memories, and a hush of sorrow. When someone mentions how beautiful Susan was I have to dab my eyes. Appetizing aromas drift from the kitchen. The fridge and the cabinet doors open and close; tableware clatters. Familiar feminine voices confer about how to arrange the buffet.

I feel a jostle on my shoulder. “Dad, Dad. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. It’s been a long day.”

“I know. You must be exhausted.

“Everyone’s asking how you and Mom met. Uncle Travis says he was there. Mom was in one of her moods because Travis and Granddad were going to a stag party put on by Grandad’s fraternity brothers from Texas Tech. and she had to stay at the hotel all by herself.

“He remembers her saying, ‘You go to your all-boys get-together. I’ll just run off with this handsome bartender. No problem, Trav. Be sure and tell Daddy.”

“Did mom really say that?”

I answered, “Whoa! Travis was there, but his memory is somewhat different from mine - and he doesn’t know the whole story.”

What’s the whole story, then?”

“Let me put it this way, Suzie. More than half the people here owe their very existence to what happened next.”