Brats, Chicken, District of Columbia , Planes and Porsches

By Arthur L. Cunningham

            I am in Wisconsin most every day of my life now.   I am retired.  I take leave of home for daily drives with my Boxer “Gabby.”  My 1973 911T Porsche has been the carriage of choice for Gabby’s walks, runs and varmint hunting.  Well then, now I have a near complete Limited Edition 914:  This winter past, at the strong suggestion our Milwaukee Region’s “Uber 914er,” Don Kiepert, I sent in to PCA for a “birth certificate” for the 914--after having found in the restoration process some suspicious looking yellow paint on the back of bumpers and rocker panels.  Sure enough, it began it’s conveyance of  “humanas cultus porscheus” in California as a number affectionately (I would like to think) called a  “Bumblebee” --with special wheels and yellow as noted with a completely black body—sporting no fabric and chrome trim on the sail/roll bar.  Therefore I can posit clearly that I drive happily most every day in a Porsche.

              Other than this year’s family Christmas and New Year’s Holidays spent in Florence and Rome, the only time I have taken to aircraft is for the District of Columbia, via Midwest Airlines (and I presume the gentle reader understands why!), and, only if my daughter Georgiana books it for me when dire necessities arise. To wit:  needed help moving into her newly purchased condominium;  assembly of new furniture, repair of fixtures;  kitchen repair and cupboard painting, et al.

            Georgiana, an education/healthcare aide to Senator Richard Lugar, calls us a few times a week, usually during our run up to dinner modality (in my younger West Coast days it was called an “attitudinal adjustment hour”). It is always good to catch up on “inside the beltway” gossip and news.  But then, once in a great while, however, there is a special tone in her voice. She directly asks for me (uh, oh, the omen-meaning D.C. and work?) and says brightly, “Pop, Dave and Amy at the Deli asked about you yesterday.”  She knows whatever task she has in mind for me is lightened with the prospect of the best quick fix, fast food sandwich ever! “OK. When does my plane leave, George?”

            It was that first trip for G’s housing move, sans her mother (someone had to take care of Gabby…), that we found the Mount Pleasant Deli up the street.  Now then, I have to tell you that my previous life mandated many a public and private dinner, mostly filled with some kind of grilled, sautéed, wrapped-in-bacon, fried, baked, casseroled, stuffed and otherwise ruined rubbery, or, spongy chicken (you don’t want to know what I did to deserve that!).  Also, I have enjoyed some nice gustatory events at such disparate ambiances as Monacle, Vidalia, Cashion’s Eat Place , and Bombay Palace-- among others.  But when I think of D.C food, I think, initially, of the Mount Pleasant Deli chicken sandwich.

            While on detail in DC, at mid-day break, I strike out with great deliberateness for the Deli and the great chicken sandwich.  I order and Dave’s face, (the proprietor), breaks into a wry quizzical smile.  It will have been at least 8 months since my last visit and I envisage his mind working to place me while engaged in the makings.  In a moment or two, without looking up, he says, “How’s things in Wisconsin ?”  Wiping his hands, Dave will come around from behind the raised cooking counter to visit genially for a few moments. We chat about the usual suspects; the neighborhood, the Oriole’s need for a good set up man in the bull pen or maybe the kicking technique of the Redskins PAT guy.  My mind says, “Nice touch and a good guy,” in a very interesting olio of a neighborhood!  Dave’s grilled chicken sandwich is served warm and juicy with a scintillating hint of some arcane Middle Eastern herb sauce in a pleasantly just right fresh roll. 

            Yesterday, with the usual and new stops on the way, Gabby and I motored in the 914 up the road to stock up on the reputed “Wisconsin State Champion Bratwurst” and “National Champion Summer Sausage” crafted at Karl’s Country Market out west on Silver Spring Dr.--a near distant meat market with a superb Deli too.   Great comestibles they have, but, ah, could I forgo Bratwurst and the great Wisconsin open roads with a 914 or 911, in a move to the District area to be nearer our daughter and, well, that chicken sandwich?  I think about it-weakly.