Mornings at the Red Hook Diner
by Bernard Greenwald

Because I have written on these pages before about breakfast food, the regular reader might think I find something celebratory about the first meal. Actually I am a very early riser, and feel grateful just to be around for another day. But breakfast is experienced with sufficiently tender, fragile feelings that I prefer to take it in the company of those whom I do not know well and who will not try to interact with me with too much intimacy or intensity. Rather than cooking at home with my family, I prefer to breakfast on the town before they are awake. I head for the Historic Village Diner on Route 9 just North of the Post Office. I lay two quarters on the counter of the Stewarts next door to pay for the Albany Times Union, because I hate waiting in line behind the purchasers of lottery tickets who are apparently awake, but who have not yet stopped dreaming.

With the benign spectre of Dr. DeSantis, my cardiologist, hovering behind me, I sit down in the diner and only have to nod when one of the lovely waitresses asks if I'll have the usual; decaf and a half order of oatmeal. By the time it arrives at my table I am already searching for the deeper meaning in Zits, Monty and Pickles on the comics pages.

The diner itself was manufactured in Patterson NJ in 1927 by the Silk City Diner Company and apparently had more than one site in Red Hook before settling permanently on Route 9. It was once known as the Half Way Diner but half way between what and what else has been lost in the pages of local history. I'm sure I'll be corrected regarding this.

The day's earliest arrivals, once farmers, are now mostly local artisans — construction workers, electricians, carpenters, plumbers, etc. Their pick-up trucks are lined up in front. Everyone seems to know everyone else, knew their parents, know their kids, and they address each other by name. Quiet conversation is the only background music. The grizzled older guys banter with the waitresses behind the counter — one has just worked her way through to a college degree in psychology; another has a new baby, another, also a mom, has worked at the Diner for many years; another is saving for a trip to India; and another is simply, beautiful, whatever her accomplishments may be.

The diner had been owned for over twenty years by Sam and Arleen Harkins but they recently sold it to Melissa Wambach and her fiancee Ryan Griffin. Melissa had been going to the diner from the time she was a small girl and had worked there for twelve years doing almost every job starting with washing dishes at the age of fifteen. She says she always wanted to own it. There are eighteen full and part-time employees, many with similarly long-lived careers: Romeo the cook has been there for fifteen years; Cindy ten, the other Melissa, five.

Many celebrities have been recognized at the diner, including Joan Rivers, Aiden Quinn, Lev Schreiber and Mia Farrow.

As the morning progresses the clientele shifts — kids on their way to high school, professionals on their way to their offices locally or in the city, Bard students, some with their studied look of dishabille. I've seen whole teams in brightly colored soccer and football uniforms and bikers in the black leather mufti. The vehicles parked outside might reveal a great range of social status, profession or income, but inside everyone is treated with the same democratic cordiality.

It's a deal: $2.49 for oatmeal, coffee and a gentle easing into the town's preoccupations and my own activities for the day.