Cheesesteaks, beach days. Weitzels.

Today was a chicken cheesesteak day.  I can't explain what this means, but trust me, it's more than just being hungry.

When I was a kid there was a sand on the floor plastic-seated restaurant on 51st street called Weitzels.  We went to the beach on 50th.  My mom started going to Weitzels in the early 70's, when her grandparents still had the big farmhouse and little cabin boarders across from Decatur, when Route 50 was a two-lane and the land next to the high school was a peach grove.  My pop, dad's dad, when he was still alive got grilled cheese with tomatoes for dinner.  Grammy, his wife, would let me drink chocolate milk.  And on certain beach days--the long kind--six, seven, eight hours of salt and sun, sand stuck between the lining of my suit and skin, total dried-out white-blond hair shiny cheek satiation...we'd get Weitzels for lunch.  I always got cheese dogs.  Mom and dad and the aunts and uncles all got cheese steaks.

Weitzels closed some years back, it happened while I was living in Oregon because the following summer when I was home again and it was summer and I felt not myself living up in Chestertown in the hot Marilen mug I found out it was gone, and I felt distinctly like someone had stolen something from me, that powerless dark feeling that embarrasses you a little with its strength. 

This morning by 9 I was on the beach hoping for an hour of waves before the guards came out.  The waves were knee-high and breaking on the shore, but the reason I didn't get my board from the car was the wind.  The waves were blowing fast towards the inlet, or south, and choppy as hell.  Otherwise it was clear blue out, and gold, from the sweet June sun.  I planned on staying til maybe 10 just getting a swim and some heat, but fell right in to the easy, laid back groove.  Four and a half hours, thoughts of my novel and poems whispering at me, I barely willed myself to leave and only really did because what I wanted was what you're supposed to eat on a glorious day with nothing but dried skin and saltwater hair.  I wanted a cheesesteak, the chicken kind, and not cut up breast meat but with shaved meat that soaks up all the grease.

Turns out Mitchells, the mini-mart we used to go to when we all lived on second street in a place that's long since been condemned and torn down, still has killer subs.  And breakfast, too.

It's a hard life, I know.

Good beach day?  Mom asked when I walked in a half hour ago, that subtle satisfaction on my face.  There was a beach chair in the front yard so I knew where she'd been all morning.  Ma I just had the best chicken cheesesteak is how I answered her.

You did you little devil?!  She grinned large.  And I was just about to ask you if you wanted to go get one, too~