I have great memories of my time as a server at Dalt’s American Grill on White Bridge Road in Nashville, Tennessee. Back in the mid-1980s, the eatery enjoyed a quick acceleration from infancy to heyday. Golden days, I thought. We employees were family, and to this day, as many as we can find stay in close contact with one another.
Working at Dalt’s was always an adventure. I could write a book on just the time I was there. I went in thinking I would be there for, at most, only a couple of years. I remember one of the first shift meetings after the extraordinarily strenuous schedule of two full weeks of training behind other more seasoned servers and taking countless tests. We were required to remember every ingredient of every dish offered on a War and Peace–sized menu.
During that shift meeting, Kitty, one of my good buddies, got her red three-year 50-percent-off-everything card. I thought, I’ll never be here that long. Surely I’ll be well on my way to an Academy Award by then. However, I was saying the same thing when I got my gold ten-year appreciation ring.
One of my favorite memories at Dalt’s occurred when a nearby elementary school held a fair. The president of the PTA came to Dalt’s, hoping we’d come to their recess yard with giveaways and coupons. Fortunately, we were rolling out our brand-new weekend brunch menu, and we were supplied with incredible Disneyesque costumes for street advertising.
An egg costume consisted of a cracked egg with the two halves held together by a stream of bright yellow yolk in the middle. The top half featured a broad face complete with a huge, happy grin. One of my best friends, Ann Estelle Stanley, wore that costume.
The obligatory bacon costume, which was, well, a slice of bacon, again with a bright, happy, huge-eyed, smiling face, was worn by Ann Green.
Mr. Pancake was the fattest, bulkiest, most hulking, most awkward costume of them all. That costume, that creature, became my alter ego. Mr. Pancake was round. Big, round, and heavy. His infrastructure was, I’m sure, made of two-by-fours. His humongous golden-brown body had two holes in the front. The wearer of said costume slid his or her arms through the holes on either side of the splat of butter in the middle, which also contained the enormous eyes and demented smile of a Steven King character. The eyes were not functional. A small patch of matching yellow mesh just below the joyful eyes was where the occupant could actually see through—a little.
The frames for the costumes were not made of fabric. Perhaps double-walled steel. Galvanized chain mail maybe. They were like the characters one might see at a theme park: solid and equipped to handle the onslaught of childhood misconduct.
We drove into the school parking lot, far enough away from the entrance to put on the costumes without the students watching. Ann Estelle and Ann Green slid into their costumes fairly easily on their own.
Mr. Pancake was laid on the ground with his deranged face to the clouds so I could lie on my back and slither backward into the dark chasm. Then Burt, the restaurant manager, stood behind me and, with brute strength, deadlifted me into a standing position.
Wearing brown costume footwear the size of small kayaks, I rested the weight of the costume on my shoulders by two metal straps with padding that was not much thicker than 2-ply toilet paper. With that, we began the trek toward the school entrance. We knew we would find the fair behind the school, on their recess field.
We turned left toward the front entrance. I glanced to our right, and through my mesh peephole, I noticed a big, long, happy banner announcing the merry event. The banner, held in place by a rope stretching through the top of the banner, ran across the front drive of the school, all the way from a tree across the drive to a flagpole outside the front of the building. Very impressive.
We walked in hot and sticky Nashville humidity in late May. That meant I quickly got the impression I should have been sizzling on a well-oiled griddle.
From the get-go, all three of us characters asked how long we were required to be at the event. Could we possibly endure? Without an answer and only a shoulder shrug from our intrepid leader, we courageously moved through the halls and out the back door.
The minute we stepped onto the field, kids thronged around us. Burt handed out balloons and coupons as boys and girls squealed over Mr. Pancake, Miss Egg, and Miss Bacon. We waved, blew kisses, and shook hands. Miss Egg and Miss Bacon gave hugs because they could slightly bend over. It was so much fun—for all of four minutes and forty-seven seconds.
We were sweltering, feeling like the Parker Solar Probe must have felt traveling 430,000 miles per hour toward the surface of the sun. The more our maniacal, smiling faces growled at Burt to get us out of there, the more he said between a forced smile and clinched teeth, “Just another few minutes.”
Burt, believing it was in his best interest, I’m sure, led us to the back of the brick building so we could at least lean against a wall. But even that was in the thick of booths, parents and kids, and a kitchen of activity. Kids were running everywhere. We just stood and waved with our outward heartwarming smiles and our less-than-cartoon attitudes.
Then came Fred, a sweet-looking little kid with a Popsicle in his hand. Fred walked up to us and smiled and waved, and we waved back. I slightly attempted the pirate dance but stopped short of bending my knees too far, out of fear of collapsing. No one enjoys a crimped up pancake. Mr. Pancake weighed 89.5 pounds, and the metal shoulder straps with toilet-paper padding were digging into my shoulders like a backpack filled with cinder blocks.
For some unfortunate reason, I kept Fred’s attention longer than I should’ve. Fred looked around to make sure his mom was nowhere in sight and then walked straight up to Mr. Pancake and kicked him in the shin. Mr. Pancake was not happy. When Mr. Pancake felt as if he’d just come out of a frying pan, it was unwise to slap him with the spatula.
Mr. Pancake, still trying to convey the same spirit as his animated face, whispered, “No, no.”
Precious little Fred stepped forward and planted his foot again into Mr. Pancake’s shin.
“Be nice to Mr. Pancake now.”
Fred, perhaps feeling the slightest pang of guilt, walked away for a couple of minutes. However, when he returned, he again made sure no one was looking before he, with a vengeance, stepped up and struck Mr. Pancake’s leg with his offending Kangaroo tennis shoe.
At that point, oppressive, glass-fogging humidity and brutal shin pain joined together to override any logical cognitive brain activity. Mr. Pancake shook a bit as he hissed, “It’s not nice to kick Mr. Pancake.” With perhaps a bit more Pennywise demeanor than intended, he added, “And it’s dangerous.”
For some unexplainable reason, all three of Mr. Pancake’s comrades were facing other directions when Fred came in for the kill. He sauntered up to Mr. Pancake, looked around with a heinous grin, and just as he threw his leg back for the fatal blow, Mr. Pancake raised his own leg.
I want to believe it was only to protect himself. However, and I’m sure it was totally accidental, Mr. Pancake’s foot came in contact with Fred’s chest. Mr. Pancake’s foot was only raised. It was not moving. Fred did, in fact, run into Mr. Pancake’s kayak.
I also want to believe it was purely unintentional that the toe end of Mr. Pancake’s shoe slightly pulsed forward as Fred came in contact with Mr. Pancake’s happy footwear.
Whatever the case, darling little Fred went sprawling backward. As there was a small downward slope behind him, he rolled a couple of times. Just a couple. Nothing serious. He stood up and stared at Mr. Pancake with eyes, I’m confident, as big as the breakfast character’s, except Fred’s chin was quivering in disbelief. He looked as though Mickey Mouse had attacked him with a spinning teacup. As he ran off bellowing into the distance, Burt, sensing trouble ahead, proclaimed, “Okay, time to go.”
Because of where we were standing, because too many people were pouring out of the doors we originally had come out of, and because Burt was horrified we might run into Fred and his mother, he chose to lead us all the way around the school and across the front drive. By then, sweat was pouring off my body in buckets, and I imagined the two Anns must’ve felt equally tired and sticky.
When we got back outside the front of the building, all I could think of was getting that convection oven off my body. Unbelievably, with a wild burst of energy, Mr. Pancake started galloping. Indeed, he sprinted straight down the front drive toward the parking lot when he saw the big, lovely, happy banner announcing the merry event strung across the asphalt.
I knew it was held up by a rope at the top, and I was aware that as I ran, I would hit the banner, and it would flap away as I galloped under it. I could not, at that moment, have cared less. All I could think about was getting out of Mr. Pancake and perhaps rolling him like an old tire into a lake.
I didn’t realize at that pivotal moment, however, that another rope held the bottom of the aforementioned banner in place as securely as the top.
Imagine, if you will, a vertical trampoline.
One second, Mr. Pancake could see an oasis in front of him. In the next, he was flying backward through the air as if a skeet shooter had just yelled, “Pull!”
I vaguely remember lying on the 400-degree concrete, as flat as a—never mind. Too easy. I was staring through yellow mesh directly into the sun. After a moment of silence, my companions checked to see if I was conscious.
Then I heard Miss Egg. I was able to see just far enough out of my yellow mesh to observe her motionless egg face, every bit like one of those bizarre mechanical clown mannequins outside a carnival funhouse, laughing its head off.
The whole thing felt surreal. Burt swarmed around me, asking if I was all right. Miss Bacon stood there wondering, I’m sure, if she was about to live up to her namesake and start sizzling. Miss Egg was still belly-laughing. I managed to crawl out of my costume the opposite of the way I’d crawled in, looking and feeling as if I’d just stepped out of a sauna. I stood up, glared at all of them, rubbed my sore shoulders, and said, “Okay, who’s ready for some brunch?”
So next time you decide to eat pancakes, remember: don’t mess with Mr. Pancake. He’s dangerous.
