The first article that I wrote and posted to this website in 2019 was about, surprise! Mr. Donald J. Trump. Mr. Trump has dominated the number of articles posted to Political Pawns And Puppets ever since he was elected to occupy the Oval Office. So I decided that my second article for this year would not be about Mr. Trump. If you are a regular visitor to this website, although it is identified as a website dedicated to information about politics, you know that I have already written articles that venture into the realm of sports and music. So why not write one that ventures into the realm of food, right? Good food… and drinks!
There’s this place called Catfish Haven that is located at 4650 Tower Road in Denver, CO that a fraternity brother of mine told me about. After he told me about it I began to see commercials about it on TV. Since my wife and I really like good catfish, I decided that I would give the place a try. One day recently when I was returning home from a couple of errands that I had run I swung by Catfish Haven. When I went inside there were a number of, in the vernacular, brothers and sisters (African American men and women, in the event that there are any readers who might not recognize the term) having a meal and drinks. I sat at the bar, which was sort of like an island located in the center of the place, and the bartender asked me if I would like a menu. I nodded in the affirmative and he brought one to me. Since I already knew what I wanted, without paying a lot of attention to it, I asked for three orders of catfish – my son likes catfish too, and selected the two side orders that came with each of the regular orders. By the way, although I did not thoroughly review the menu, I noticed that there were many other soul food items on it that really attracted my attention. I will have to be sure to try them at another time.
Anyway, as I looked around at the people who were at our island bar, I noticed that the drinks that most of them were having were alcoholic beverages. Of the three people closest to me, one was having beer, another was having white wine and I couldn’t really determine what the third was having. There were two fairly young-looking brothers (still in the vernacular) sitting at the bar at a right angle from me who were casually chatting, and occasionally laughing, as they ate. I couldn’t determine what they were drinking either. The bartender interrupted my probing thoughts on this place and its atmosphere and asked if I would like a drink. After having surveyed everyone else at the bar that was having drinks I thought, why not? I’ll have a Smirnoff and tonic, I said. They were out of Smirnoff so I ordered Grey Goose and told the bartender to hold the tonic. On the rocks, he asked? No, straight up, I said.
Basketball highlights were being aired on the sports channel so when the bartender brought my drink I struck up a conversation with the person sitting next to me. He was having catfish. I asked him about his thoughts on Catfish Haven’s catfish and had intended to follow up using the basketball highlights as a conversation piece. But before he could answer, the guy sitting next to him on his left commented to him about how one of the players in the highlights banged his head off of the backboard while successfully blocking his opponent’s shot. The conversation immediately switched to basketball and the three of us talked about various teams around the league including the Denver Nuggets. While we were discussing this, another man who appeared to be in his late twenties to early thirties approached the bar and joined the conversation. He had a distinct Caribbean accent. He talked about what a good team the Denver Nuggets are now and the great potential that they have to go from their current status of being one of the best teams in the NBA to becoming a world champion.
His conversation drifted into the political realm as he began to talk about violent cities – including Denver, how the police treated people of color versus how they treated white people and the gentrification of neighborhoods from Park Hill in east Denver to the Montbello Green Valley Ranch neighborhoods in far northeast Denver. Those of us involved in the conversation gently challenged him on his perspective and comments about Denver being one of the most violent cities in the country. The guy to the left of me asked him how long he had been in Denver. His response was 10 years. The guy on my left said that he had been in Denver since 1972 and stated that he disagreed with his assessment of Denver being among the most violent cities in the country. I told him that I had been in Denver since the mid 1950s and that I too disagreed with him. Shortly after that the other patrons involved in our conversation appeared to lose interest in what this relatively new-comer to our fair city had to say. Not me. Being a writer, I grew even more interested in his perspective on things.
Where are you from, I asked him. Jamaica; I’m the chef here, he said. As we continued to talk I gave him one of my cards, it has a picture of my first book on the front with my name on the spine of the book, and told him to Google my name and he would find my website along with a couple of articles in the Denver Post and the Boulder Camera that I had written. Check it out, I said. He then told me that he had a music studio in Park Hill and showed me a few rap music videos that he had made. He said that he was still fine-tuning them but he was pleased with what he had so far. He spoke fondly of his father as he continued to chat about his videos. Just then, the bartender brought my order and I politely excused myself and paid for it. I told him that I would return in the future and that I hoped that we would be able to talk further. We shook hands and I left.
By the time that I reached my car, my phone rang. It was my wife. I realized then that I had been gone for a really long time, especially since I had told her that I was going to run a couple of short errands and would be right back. I expected that she might be a little bit upset. But when I told her I had stopped at Catfish Haven for catfish all seemed to have been forgiven because she simply said, great! I’ll see you when you get home! Married life; ain’t it grand!
Eulus Dennis – author, Operation Rubik’s Cube and Living Between The Line