Restaurants come and go in our small town (the Bog, one of our favorite local hamburger places, closed down two weeks ago, and the pandemic knocked off the Round House Cafe), but The  Cambridge Diner has been popular and busy since the 1930s.

It is perhaps the town’s best-loved icon.

Cambridge is a small town; there are only two restaurants left, the Diner and a new Mexican restaurant that replaced the Round House on the ground floor of Hubbard Hall, our arts center.

We have some great new food carts in town, but the diner remains the unchallenged Queen of Cambridge dining.

When I first moved to the Cambridge area 15 years ago, I went to the Diner often for breakfast; they were long on atmosphere and short on great food. The chef stood over the grill smoking and sometimes dropping his ashes into the eggs.

The eggs always tasted fine. But it’s not like that anymore.

I stopped going to the d when I moved to Hebron, and when we moved back to our current town just outside of  Cambridge, we didn’t go out for breakfast much, we both get to work early.

Once I was diagnosed with diabetes, I admit that I was wary of the menu. It wasn’t exactly set up with diabetics in mind.

The Diner, now called the Country Gals Cafe, is the locals’ favorite eating place.

The people running it are friendly and very popular. The walls are covered with pictures of local athletes and teams,  and the food is basic small-town dinner but solid.

They know their town; they are jammed every day, breakfast and lunch. And there aren’t a lot of people in my town. Sometimes I think half of them are at the diner.

It’s also gotten healthier; they even have wheat toast, and a number of things I can eat.

Although the diner is not into organic dining or hot new cuisine.

When we came in, I was surprised to be greeted loudly and warmly by name.

It was Tori, who I’ve known for years and who has worked hard in many places. It took me a moment to place her. It was the voice. You always know where she is.

She worked at Yushak’s Deli, at the Blog and has been happily employed at the Diner for two-and-a-half years. She seems there to stay.

 

(Tori)

We were delighted to see one another. It was a sweet reunion.

I don’t know anyone at the Diner, and they don’t know me. Tori is the picture postcard-perfect wait person at a diner, vigilant, loud, friendly, and incredibly hard-working.

She surprised me by saying that Eileen, a long-time blog reader, and supporter, had called and written the Diner and left money to pay for our breakfast (I cannot imagine how she knew we would be going there today, we hadn’t been there in several years and we just decided to go this morning.)

The longer I live, the more I believe in spirits.

The mysterious and generous donor Eileen also sent money so the restaurant could offer free meals to animal lovers, especially cat lovers. She regularly sends us stamps, animal stories clipped from newspapers, and some money to buy dog or donkey treats.

I’ve never met Eileen, but she has sent me books, calendars, and donations for animal welfare for years. We’ve never spoken. She lives in California.

The restaurant owner showed me the cards and calendars Eileen sent her this week and asked me what to do with the money Eileen had sent.

She was puzzled.

“I’ve never heard of Jon Katz,” she said, unimpressed.  “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

I stifled the impulse to tell her I hadn’t heard of her either, but that wasn’t true.  She’s a lot better known than I am.

People in town always tell me how much they love her and the Diner. We agreed she should give them to cat lovers and other needy animal lovers.

Tori says the owners of the Diner are the best bosses she ever had, “they are wonderful people to work for,” she said. I don’t often hear that, and that is impressive. And Tori knows a lot about bosses.

Apart from the heavily sugared and canned strawberries and syrup poured over my oatmeal (I did ask for strawberries with the oatmeal, my bad), there are healthy things for me to eat if I pay attention and order carefully. I even got healthy full-grain wheat toast and V-8 juice.

Maria was happy with her scrambled eggs and home fries.

Things have changed, although not that much. We’ll be back.

 

(Maria warming her hands at the Country Gal’s Diner)

Several people brought me the things I left behind on the table as we left – some of Eileen’s cards and calendars.

Several other people recognized me (I even saw two former residents of the Mansion having breakfast with their families) and said they were glad to see Maria and me in the Diner.

Sociologists would have a field today studying which people in a small town go to which restaurants.

From the first, the Diner has held and attracted the locals; you rarely saw a local person at the Round House Cafe, emphasizing organized and healthy foods. The Cambridge Diner is a working people’s place.

They seem to reject and even resent the new. People like what they have always liked and what their mothers and fathers liked.

The new food restaurants seem to be the ones that struggle, while the traditional restaurants and diners seem to thrive. Change comes slowly to small towns, but it does inevitably come.

A lot of the newer, healthier restaurants around the year were swallowed up by the pandemic.

The Diner didn’t seem to lose a beat. They even opened a back room a few years ago to handle the overflow and now have a 4-7 p.m. dinner menu most weekdays.

I was glad to be there, too; we’ll be regulars. We know how to order. One day, if I live long enough, I might even be considered a “local.” I doubt it.

Breakfast was on the house. The tab would have been $16.35.

I told Tori she had to be our waitress, “no problem,” she roared, “I’m here every day.”

Deal.