We Walk into a Cantina in Old Town Clovis

Henry’s Cantina, Clovis, California

“Hey, what are you doing?” Someone was yelling inside Henry’s Cantina. We couldn’t be sure if he was talking to us, but there was no one else around. We were outside, taking pictures of the place. So we went inside.

“We thought somebody was about to get served,” the bartender said, but she wasn’t the one who yelled. There were only two other people in the bar, a couple. We introduced ourselves, and learned that the couple was Den and Maria, and the bartender was LoLo. LoLo had been curious about the guy taking pictures outside, so Den had taken it upon himself to find out the story.

So we told them about our project to visit a bar and a church every week, and that this month’s bar visits are dedicated to Old Town Clovis since I’m working in a hotel there.

We learned that Henry’s has been around for awhile; the building is 150 years old. All three people in the bar quickly assured us that if we’d come at another time, we’d have found more people there. After ten minutes or so, other people did come in. And when they came in, LoLo greeted them effusively, usually giving them a hug. (We didn’t get a hug, but then again, she didn’t know us yet when we walked in.)

I ordered a bourbon and water and Mindy asked about ciders. LoLo suggested a Peach Bellini. Mindy said sure, though she wasn’t entirely sure what she’d get. Turns out it’s a malt beverage in a bottle.

When we came in, rock music was playing and World’s Most Amazing Videos (naked skiers, geek fight club, grisly soccer injuries) was playing on the TV. But after a while, LoLo asked Den if he’d like the channel changed when The Walking Dead came on, remembering he was a fan.

I sat next to Den and Maria, and they told me they were in the neighborhood to see their daughter, but she wasn’t home, so they came to Henry’s. Good grandparents that they are, it wasn’t long before they were telling me about their grandchildren. I heard about a grandson who was learning karate and a granddaughter who was into hip-hop. Maria showed me pictures of her granddaughter in a recent performance, and, yes, she was adorable.

An old guy in a cowboy hat at the end of the bar asked for country music and Lolo checked with everyone else to see if they were okay with that and she made the change. (Particularly, he requested Marty Robbins’ “The Streets of Laredo.”) Another man said, "No karaoke tonight, then?" Lolo said no, not this week.

Eventually I asked Maria and Den the two questions we always ask, “What makes for a good bar?” and “What makes for a good church?” (Many times we phrase that second question with the preface, “Whether you go to church or not,” but Den and Maria had already mentioned that they’d been to St. John’s in downtown Fresno.) Den said a good bar should have “friendly conversation. When you walk in you feel welcome. You don’t feel looked down on.”

It was important to Maria that “the waitress is friendly.” They like LoLo. LoLo also bartends at the Outlaw Tavern in Clovis, and Maria and Den said they follow her where she goes. Maria said she goes to a bar as a “stress reliever;” she wants to go to a place where she can relax and talk with people.

Maria told me about a bad experience at another bar. She’d had a tough day at work. She wanted to go out for a drink, but she was too tired to get dressed up so she just threw on a sweatshirt, an Oakland Raiders sweatshirt. When they went up to the bar, the bartender said, “We don’t serve Raiders fans.”

Den said there was no indication that the guy was joking, but even if he was, people shouldn’t joke like that if they don’t know the people they’re dealing with. Maria knew Den would react to what the bartender said, and he didn’t disappoint. Eventually the manager tried to smooth things out, but clearly, the two don’t want to return to the place anytime soon. (Henry’s Cantina, on the other hand, has signage to indicate it is a welcoming place for the Raider Nation. I admitted I was a hurting 49ers fan, as all 49ers fans are these day, and Den offered nothing but sympathy.)

Den also said a good bar was makes accommodations for guests -- for instance, changing the music or TV for people, as Lolo had shown she was willing to do. Maria mentioned that a good test of a bar is whether they make a good Bloody Mary. (LoLo popped into the conversation at that moment saying, “A Bloody Mary is a good sign.” She mentioned she’d learned how to make good Bloody Marys from Sherry, the bartender at Outlaw who she greatly admires and works with on occasion.)

As for what makes for a good church, Maria quickly said the priest. Den said there are two faces to religion. There can be an ugly side that judges people, but there is also a side with openness and understanding where people speak from the heart.

Maria then asked for no more questions, but I still asked her to tell me more about her granddaughter (who will be in a dance show at the Saroyan Theater soon). Maria said that Den could talk to people all night long.

Meanwhile, Mindy was talking to the man next to her at the bar. Lolo had asked about his motorcycle and his new baby when he came in, teasing him for not coming to the bar for awhile. He introduced himself to Mindy as Anthony and told her that a way to know a good bar was when the bartender was “somebody like LoLo. She always remembers what you want” and will probably have it ready by the time you sit down. Aside from that, he said, the important thing was whether the bar fits you. “I like small. Classic rock, chill, people my age or older. I don’t want a bunch of punks who want to fight.” If all that’s good, he says the price isn’t as important.

When Mindy asked what made for a good church, he said, “I went to Christian school.” In those days, he also attended a local megachurch. As he got older, “my understanding of how things work changed.” He particularly didn’t like the big church’s emphasis on money. Now, he said, he likes Cornerstone.“You can be who you are”

He talked a little about wearing fancy clothes to church to show honor to God. “In my opinion God doesn’t care what you wear, he cares about who you are.” He mentioned a weekly men’s meeting at Cornerstone where a free meal is served, followed by worship. “It’s pretty awesome.” He said he also likes Lifepointe.

So, to answer Den’s initial question, “What are you doing?” We were having a great time with the fine folks at Henry’s Cantina, even though they didn’t do karaoke that night after all.  

We Walk into a Bar in Wisconsin

Tom's Old Bogies, Holcombe

“Eva, good day or bad day?”

“Good day!”

“All right, just wanted to know how to make your drink!”

Penny the bartender greeted almost everyone cheerfully as they entered Tom’s Old Bogies bar on the Chippewa River.

We came on the recommendation of my niece, Sarah. Her dad (my brother) has a cabin in the area, and Sarah stayed there recently while she finished a writing project. She went to Bogie’s for a change of scenery. She told us about Tom the owner and his wife the school teacher and some of the staff and customers at the bar. She said the people were friendly and kind. (She also told us about another place where the people weren’t friendly and kind.) She assured us that Bogie’s should be our bar for Wisconsin.

The place looks like a log cabin in the woods, because it is a log cabin in the woods. We were pleased to see the parking lot was fairly full when we pulled in late on a Wednesday afternoon. I went to the street to take pictures, and Mindy went to the door. A woman who’d just come out asked Mindy where we were staying in the area, and Mindy was embarrassed to admit she wasn’t sure of the exact name of the neighborhood. I told the woman, Margie, that we were “near Holcombe Lake”. “Lake Holcombe”, she corrected me. (As back in California at my hotel job I endlessly gave the correct pronunciation of “Healdsburg.”)

The inside of the bar looks like the interior of a hunting cabin. There’s even a large knife hanging from the ceiling. A sign on the wall read, “Caution: Fishing and hunting stories in progress. Protective boots may be required,” and we did talk to some folks about fishing. A shoebox with several squash (perhaps for the taking?) was on a bench by the door, and, of course, there was a cow skull on one of the walls. There were maps available for ATV trails in the area. The news was playing on television screens mounted on either end of the bar.

When the NBC nightly news ran a story about allegations of fraud in the Trump campaign, someone said. “That’s a crock of [deleted for the kids]. This is just the Democrat News Network.”

Someone else said, “Half the movie stars in California say they’ll move to Canada if Trump is elected.”

“Do we need them?” someone else asked.

“Nope,” several people responded.  

Someone else mentioned she'd seen a homemade sign hanging over road kill deer which read, “He was going to vote for Hilary, but we took care of it.”

Before Margie left, I asked her our two questions, “What makes for a good bar?” and “What makes for a good church?”I asked our two questions to Margie, the woman who asked where we were from, our two questions.  She said that for a bar, “It’s the people. In a small community like this one, everyone has to work together. Even if you’re a stranger. Last year there was a couple from Illinois, and he had an accident cutting a tree. He had a broken pelvis and was in the hospital for four weeks. People got together and cut them enough firewood to get them through the winter.” When I asked about what made for a good church, she gave me detailed directions to St. Francis Catholic church.

This led Penny the bartender to ask what we were up to, “The owner was in a minute ago. He wanted to know.” We told her about our project to visit a bar and a church in every state and that we were there upon the recommendation of our niece. “Oh, I remember her. She worked quietly on a table in the back there.”

I talked to the man next to me at the bar, Derk. He’s worked for the railroad for the last twenty one years and has been coming to Bogie’s for the last twenty. He said there’s only been two owners during that time, Tom for the last twelve and Dave Thatcher before that. I asked if the place changed at all when Tom took over. Derk said, “It’s cleaner now.”

I asked him what makes for a good bar, and he said, “Service. Somebody who’s not playing on their phone or talking to just one person but keeps everyone happy.” I asked if that was true of the staff at Bogie’s and he said, “That’s why I keep coming back.”

I asked what would make for a good church, “I have no idea. It’s not my thing.” I pressed him a bit on what might make it a good church for others, and he said, “It does a lot for a lot of people but not for me.”

Meanwhile, Mindy was asking the three men at her end of the bar about what makes for a good bar and church. Ken said the answer was the same for both places. “Good people. Like we’re doing here, talking. People can communicate.”

Another man added, “It’s something to do on a rainy day.”

And it was a rainy day. While we were there, someone called Penny the bartender to let her know that a tree was hanging perilously over the highway nearby, and she let the customers know. (We were glad the damage wasn’t on the road we’d be taking. The next day we heard that the storm had dropped record amounts of rain in several nearby areas.)

Finally, we were able to ask Penny the bartender about what makes for a good bar. “There should be a welcome feeling when you come in, camaraderie. And for us, we’re all close family. Coming here is like coming home. Bogie’s doesn’t feel like a typical bar, it’s cozy. I keep telling Tom we need easy chairs in here.”

Penny isn’t a church goer, so she didn’t give an answer for what would make for a good church. But when she heard what Ken had to say, she added, “Man made both buildings. I’ll pray in a bar.”

We’ finished our drinks* so we headed back into the rain and the beauty of the Wisconsin woods. (Thanks, Sarah, for sending us to Tom’s Old Bogies.)

*We stopped in Dixon, Illinois, last week, where we met two women with Wisconsin roots. One of them told us we had to have the Wisconsin version of a Bloody Mary, so that’s what Mindy ordered. Sure enough, instead of celery, her drink had an olive and a whole dill pickle on one toothpick with a strip of jerky and a straw. Dean had a rum and coke.