I crave hot dogs the way crack heads crave rock. My preferred dealer is the Gray’s Papaya at West 72nd Street and Broadway. Last April, I decided to give into the hankering before a hair appointment. After injecting two dogs (well done, no kraut, no onions) I exited Gray’s wearing the afterglow of gastronomic pleasure. At the corner, I noticed an older white man noticing me. His 1980s navy blue Members Only jacket read retiree. His close-cropped gray hair read conservative. He smiled warmly then said, “They make great hot dogs right?”
I hadn’t seen him inside, but making the acquaintance of a fellow hot-dog connoisseur was always welcomed. “They sure do,” I said beaming.
“I missed ‘em.They don’t have ‘em in Florida. I always go to Gray’s when I come north for a visit.”
The walk signal turned green. I crossed to the north side of 72nd Street where the hair salon sits in the middle of a block of commercial stores. The elderly man followed. I let him.With all my family back in Michigan, I missed chatting with older relatives.
“I love hot dogs,” I said as we moved east past the Capital One Bank branch. “I once grilled some using the headlights of my car after arriving in the Hamptons after dark; couldn’t wait until morning.” I puffed my chest out, half expecting the old guy to pin a medal on me. He let out a grandfatherly chuckle, the type doled out when a child surprised him with an art class ashtray coated in bright tempura paint.
By the time we walked beyond The Buttercup Bakery, I’d learned he’d retired to Florida after running a printing business in lower Manhattan. “I go back and forth, changing up the seasons,” he said. As the rose glow of the evening sun spilled across the pet store windows, the sidewalk and us, I imaged we were a multi-culti postcard of connection: black and white, young and old. I smiled, pleased that my Midwestern love of spontaneous chatter still held, even after 20 years of living in Manhattan.
At the entrance of the salon I slipped my elderly friend one last smile and said, “Well, this is my stop. Great talking to you.”
He returned the smile and then said, “I’m staying at The Pierre Hotel. My room number is 236.”
I’d begun to strategize how to get out of an early bird special invite, when he said, “I’d give you $200 if you let me go down on you.”
Ten years ago, I withered a flasher’s kielbasa-sized hard-on by pointing out how pathetic he was with his member out in the 14th Street F station, mid-afternoon. I don’t shock easily. But in that moment, lulled into an illusion of innocent connection, doped up on sodium-laced meats, my head snapped back from shock like a spring-loaded bobble-head doll. Grandpa was offered up some tongue action with a monetary bonus? Isn’t that how Nelson Rockefeller died, playing hide the salami with some young girl? Grandpa, you have to be fucking kidding me! I said in my head but, “You know there are women who do that kind of thing for a living,” came out of my mouth.
The old man’s face remained smooth as silk. Either he regularly played this game or Viagra gives men a stronger backbone along with a boner on demand.
“Well, if you change you mind, you know where to find me. Have a good night,” he said and was gone.
I entered the salon and tumbled into the stylist’s chair, stiff from shock. Seravia looked at me with worried eyes and asked, “What’s the matter?”
The female handbook mandates when the person who cares for the outside of your head asks about the inside, you must answer truthfully. So I did and she snorted and hooted over the thunder of blow dryers and the buzz of patron gossip repeating, “He said WHAT!?” over and over. Then her mouth fell and stayed open, slowly sliding into a serious smirk. “That old man knew you weren’t a pro. That’s why he wanted you. Cool leather jacket and boots, you still got it.”
Sex therapists say the stranger hookup is the number-one fantasy of women. Sure, I’ve had them. But mine frequently involve Clive Owen, a cashmere blindfold, police grade handcuffs, a case of Pol Roget champagne and a midget. A sexagenarian hook-up? No thanks. At 18, my first old geezer was a nude model in a Parsons freshman figure drawing class—complete with springy snow-white pubic hair and man boobs that dipped to his lap—and he caused sour vomit to crawl up my throat.
Yet months later, I can’t evict the ancient Marquis de Sade from my mind. Sure Hugh Hefner and Larry King get plenty of action, but had I missed something vital during our chat? Was some of that hot-dog talk really code for something else? My friend Tina agreed, “It sounds like that old man wanted to show you a whole ‘nother hot dog,” she said and snickered into her glass of Pinot Noir. After another sip, she added, “I bet if he looked like Javier Bardem you’d have taken him up on it.”
I doubt it. I lack the sense of adventure. Sure, a hunk with a talented tongue isn’t easy to find, but maybe what’s even more difficult to find is a moment of real connection. Like the one I’ve always found with my favorite hot dog.
Jenine Sanford Holmes, is an advertising copywriter and creative non-fiction writing junkie. Her work has appeared in The Detroit News and The Westsider among other papers.
