TRICKY DICK'S COFFEE HOUSE: 14) OFF THE GRID

A Throwback Thursday Memoir About Living in London in the 1970s

Arriving in Washington, D.C. (spring ‘77), I rented a car at Dulles airport and drove to the off-campus digs of Scotty S, a buddy from American University (AU).  A couch was assigned to me; I borrowed a sheet and blanket from Stephanie B and her brother, who had an apartment nearby.  I never returned the bedding, and I've felt bad about it ever since.

Scotty took me to the Tavern and wanted to party; I just wanted a pillow following a long flight, economy of course, squeezed in a like sardine between two aisles, everyone around you sucking on nonstop cigarettes, secondhand smoke curling round and round and infiltrating your nose, mouth and eyes, not to mention the five-hour lag.

Next day, Mrs. Quigley answered her phone and told me her husband, Carroll, had passed away after a heart attack one month before.

So I drove downtown to Liberty Lobby in search of new info on Bilderberg.

"We have a guy that specializes on Bilderberg named Peter Reynolds," said a Liberty Lobbyist.  "Let me try and get him on the phone for you."

Peter Reynolds possessed a gravelly voice that added years to his age.  He asked me to come up to his house for a chat that afternoon.

Reynolds, it transpired, was only a few years older than I, and lived with his parents.  There was something very odd about him.  He slouched in a sofa and toyed with a loaded handgun while awaiting a Neil Diamond concert on TV, for which he'd wired up stereo speakers.

Reynolds told me he was flying to Britain two months hence to cover a Bilderberg Conference scheduled to take place in Torquay, a resort town in Devon.  He asked if I would help him.  I was game, hell, anything that smacked of intrigue or journalism.  That's why I was in Washington again, to stir the pot.

Over at AU, the "Fighting Fifth" of Leonard Hall were fighting fit and had, in my absence, carved a reputation as the rowdiest, most lunatic floor on campus.  The windows in the TV room now had iron bars on them because they'd thrown out a TV set during a keg party. The whole floor was on probation. 

I hung out there for an afternoon and generally purged myself of any further desire to be in DC.

I got a cheap haircut on Connecticut Avenue, bought a coonskin cap for Jolie and re-booked my departure date two days early. 

It seemed I could never get back to London soon enough.  As with school, I never wanted to complete a cycle, perhaps subconsciously believing if I left something unfinished it was still there to return to.

Returning to London I felt euphoric.  

Only six days to everyone else, to me it was six months' of spiritual growth and rejuvenation.  I felt sure about London, about Tricky Dick's.

My positive vibes were marred only by an ugly incident at the restaurant the night before my return. 

The pool thugs had turned nastier than usual, started a fight, and when ordered out by Clive, had smashed pool balls against the TV games and pinball machines, leaving shattered glass everywhere.  The police were called for the third or fourth time and they were growing weary of us.

I took one look at the basement mess and proclaimed the pool hall closed.  Forever.  Whatever the revenues, I wasn't going to let Tricky Dick's degenerate into a ruffian's refuge. 

Sure, we were making more money than we ever had; we were actually in black ink, a Tricky Dick's first.  But some things are more important than money.  

The games company. NPB, was appalled by my stance (they had the most to lose) and tried to change my mind.  Suddenly, they were no longer upset about the damage and dropped their demand that I help pay for it.  They even offered to increase our take of the revenues.  

But I was adamant.  This experiment had been a financial success but a social failure. I agreed only to let them move one pool table to the mezzanine, where we could more easily monitor play.

In retrospect, if we were out simply to make money, we could have turned the whole damn place into a large pool hall, with food and drink an aside.  Low overhead, high profit margin. 

But what the hell did we know about business? 

Tricky Dick's was a sociology course; it had nothing to do with business.  It was an eccentric's haven, some nights a depository for the mentally insane.  And it forever amazed me that the authorities never came along and locked us all inside, quarantined the place. 

Because years later I discovered we never possessed a special license to stay open all night.  We opened late because Abe Sellar and his One Dollar Bill before us had opened late, and he opened late to hide from creditors, and because Gigi, before him, had opened late.  And no one ever knew by what authority Gigi stayed open all night.

We ran the place as anarchists. 

Many of our customers were banned from other cafes and restaurants for insufficient funds or problems related to non-conformity and authority issues.  Once in a while, someone from the real world concern would visit and say we had to pay something to someone for some reason. 

One guy (jacket, tie, briefcase) cornered my brother and said we owed a monthly copyright fee for playing cassette tapes on the stereo. 

Then VAT inspectors descended on us:  A shake down for sales tax, which we’d never charged customers and never paid since opening three years earlier.

A “rates” bill (property tax assigned to lease-holders) showed up addressed to Abe Sellar, requesting payment from five years before.

(Such was Britain back then, miss those days.)

We heard that a protection racket was operating up and down Finchley Road, but they must have heard how crazy we all were, and about the Louisville Slugger I kept under the counter with their names etched onto it.  They never bothered us.  

Bruce S came back to work, and he shared the kitchen with Dave W, a pretty boy, cool as a cucumber, always smoking cigarettes in the kitchen when I wasn't around.  

And I hired a Canadian girl named Diane D, a take-charge kind of gal with lots of initiative.  She came with baggage: A short, barrel-chested, walrus-mustached lout named Ray, her fiancee.

As long as everyone turned up on schedule, I was free to hit the pubs early evening and oversee the whole operation, including the live entertainment, which I personally auditioned and hired. 

So I'd go out to Swiss Cottage and The Red House in St. John’s Wood, mix it up, meet girls.  When they asked what I did, I'd say I was a dishwasher for a restaurant. 

When the pubs closed, we'd drive up to Tricky Dick's.  I'd seat my new friends and strut around as if I owned the place.  And when they pointed this out to me, "Why are you telling waitresses what to do like you own the place," I'd say, "I do own the place— and I wash dishes."  

And then I'd go back into the kitchen and wash dishes, because that was my favorite job when high.  Especially on weekends, when the place was a madhouse, people screaming for their orders, asking for the manager…

Washing dishes was safe—and very results oriented.