Juke Box Treat

Even when Air Canada decides to delay your flight six hours without letting you know, or compensating you, sometimes there are still hidden treasures to discover.

I spent all of yesterday afternoon with my husband and boys at the Vancouver airport waiting for a flight to Toronto. We arrived at 3am local time, which was far too late to drive home to Kingston ON. So, after a short sleep at an airport hotel and an expensive taxi ride to our car,(we’d missed our ride because of the delay) no one was in a particularly good mood, or really hungry. Yet, we decided to stop for breakfast before heading to the highway. We were in the Sheppard and Keele area of Toronto, which is not an area we know well, nor would I say is it known for its restaurants. My husband Rob pulled into the first restaurant he saw in a not terribly appealing strip mall, unfortunately located next to an Adult Video store. He waved for me to check it out, me being the pickiest eater in our family, and the least interested in greasy spoon breakfasts. I wasn’t expecting much, but when I opened the door of the diner, I saw booths upholstered in sparkly red vinyl, matching red vinyl stools along a bar, a vintage milkshake machine and best of all, juke boxes in each booth.

 

 

 I gave my husband the thumbs up and he herded our sleepy boys into the Downsview Restaurant.  Breakfast was pancakes for the boys, eggs and coffee for Rob and I. The food was standard diner fare, but I was really interested in the juke box. I’m not sure I’ve ever really seen one, except for a tacky reproduction in someone’s basement. When I asked the waitress, who told me she and her husband have run the restaurant for 64 (!) years if the juke box worked, she smiled and said, "Sometimes." I gambled five quarters and was able to listen to three songs. Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” wouldn’t work, but Tina Turner’s  “We Don’t Need Another Hero” was remarkably clear as was John Cougar Mellencamp’s “Hurt So Good,” a song I don’t think I’ve heard since high school when my boyfriend made me a mix tape. (I didn’t tell my husband this.)  The kids pepped up enough to dance with us in the booth while we ate. We listened to part of Roy Orbison’s “Crying” before the juke box stopped working, which was too bad, because I was suddenly desperate to hear Tears for Fears’ “Everybody Wants to Rule The World.” We shamelessly took pictures like the tourists we were, while the regulars looked on in amusement. Every time the gears of the juke box dropped a different 45 onto its playing mechanism, there was a distinctly pleasant metallic smell. I don’t remember record players having a particular scent, but suddenly I was in my grandparents’ house in Montreal, if only just briefly.  

I’m still irked with Air Canada and my lost time and extra jet-lagged kids, but the diner was a lovely break in our travels.