Remember When America Was Great?

The following experience dates from 1987 or 1988 when I was in San Francisco on business and by the end of the week was sick of the same crummy meals every night at the Marriott Hotel.

So, I asked the last customer whom I saw that day to recommend where I could eat some kind of ‘home-cooked’ meal, without actually having to be a guest in someone’s home.

This guy told me to go to the Gay & Lesbian Synagogue in the Castro District where they had a big, buffet after the brief Sabbath service on Friday night.

“Everyone competes with everyone else to make the best food,” he told me, and he turned out to be absolutely correct.

The buffet was overflowing with tasty this and tasty that, and at some point, as I was chomping down meatballs and something-or-other a guy my age (I was in my 40’s) came up, said ‘hello’ and obviously wanted to see if I was interested in some talk and then who knows what?

I immediately knew from this guy’s accent that he, like me, was from New York. So, after I made it pleasantly clear that I had come out to the Castro only for the food but not for a date, I asked him how he ended up on the West Coast and this is what he said: “My parents are religious, and I knew by the time I finished high school that it would break their hearts if I told them I was gay. So, I moved…