(Originally published 11/20/17)
While duly
employed in another line of work more than two decades ago, my boss, Richie, spotted
a couple of our regular customers, Bud and Carol, dining in a Nathan’s
fast-food restaurant. At the time, he was cruising down the well-traveled
Central Avenue in Yonkers and noticed them—courtesy of the place’s paneled
glass windows adjoining the busy thoroughfare—seated at a table. Were it not
for the fact that it was Thanksgiving evening, this sighting would not have
been worth mentioning.
Often a stoic who played his compassionate side close to the vest, Richie nonetheless
found something poignant at the spectacle of this long-married couple eating at
Nathan's on Thanksgiving Day. After all, Bud and Carol were pleasant enough folks
who spent a fair chunk of change shopping in our store every week. Bud was
retired and significantly older than his wife, and they had no children. That
is, if you did not count their menagerie of animal friends, which included, at one time or another, everything from minks to ferrets to monkeys. And, yes, they
had multiple cats and dogs, too. Anyway, Richie thought it would be a nice
gesture to invite Bud and Carol to our business’s upcoming Christmas party,
which he did. They happily accepted and a grand time was had by all.
Fast
forward twenty-five years and Bud and Carol are still among the living. They
are, however, experiencing financial woes. Money troubles that Bud never
envisioned when he retired after a lengthy and productive working career.
Considering Bud and Carol’s ample brood of mouths to feed—and the amount of
money they spent on them for food, supplies, and medical care—we were all
convinced that Bud had quite a tidy nest egg and would never, ever be sweating
the bucks.
Last
winter, however, old Bud materialized at Richie’s new place of business. He
requested a helping hand—i.e., a cash allowance to pay off a large and overdue fuel bill. It was a brutal winter and Richie, who had not seen the
man in years, did not have the heart to say no. It was a distressing tale of
woe that a former professional and proud man—who was now closing in on ninety
years of age—did not have enough money to pay basic household bills. Bud
informed Richie that the recent economic meltdown did a real number on his
retirement portfolio. It is a cautionary tale, I guess, that all too many of us
may face in retirement—if we make it that far and are
pushing ninety.
Looking
back on it now, I suppose that Bud and Carol’s past Nathan’s Thanksgiving
repast was a happier, less stressful dining experience than the one they will be
having this year. And as a postscript to this story: That sprawling, iconic
Nathan’s restaurant on Central Avenue was bulldozed a few years ago to make
room for yet another ubiquitous strip mall. There is a much smaller, decidedly
pedestrian Nathan’s in the mix of stores on that hallowed ground, so Bud and Carol
can dine there this Thanksgiving if they so desire and if, of course, they can
afford it.
