Jonathan C. Lewis
Author and Artist
Going Bananas
A fictional travelogue; four minutes to read.
At the southwest corner of Van Ness and 18th streets in San Francisco, the iconic street sign for Whiz Burgers is peeling paint as if badly sunburned. I’m in the ruins of an archaeological site, a living museum, the remnants of a fast-food temple.
The shabby, mustard-colored cook shack has a large grill, and rows of shelves teetering with foodstuffs, paper goods and plastic cups. The outside walls are plastered with faded, dated posters. The picnic tables are bolted in place, layered with decades of built-up paint. Gooey food wrappers stick to wood benches.
Sizzling burgers billow an aroma that beckons from a block away. The place remains upright because, evidently, half a century of grease and grit reinforces structural integrity.
In its heyday, Whiz Burgers swaggered. Carhops in short skirts roller-skating to and from hungry patrons delivered juicy burgers, thick milkshakes, salty French fries. On balmy San Francisco evenings, teenagers still park out back, pass around food and fumble with buttons and bras.
At the walk-up window, I place my order. From behind the counter an anonymous voice doesn’t ask my name or give me a numbered receipt. Unnamed, unnumbered, unnoticed, unbothered is how I like to eat my fast food.
After a wait, the same faceless voice announces with complete indifference, “burger, fries, shake.” Digging into a plain brown paper bag, I find my burger underneath a pile of ketchup packets. Half the ketchup will make it onto my fries, the remainder onto my shirt.
The house specialty is a bleached yellowy banana milkshake. Banana shakes are the justifiable healthy choice. Bananas have nutrients and antioxidants, and lots of heart-healthy potassium. Ignore the calories.
Suctioning the frosty sweetness across my tongue, I savor the froth slithering around in my mouth. Chunks of ripened bananas mash against my teeth. Marinated in slurpy, sensuous banana coldness, my brain freezes.
People-watching at the Whiz rivals the coffee houses of Europe. A three-man construction crew in neon-green safety vests, speaking Spanish, orders enough food for five times their number. Two acne-faced teenagers—a boy and a girl—dressed in unisex sweatshirts are laughing and holding hands. A charismatic, tattooed, middle-aged woman with skin the color of a root beer float tells her colleague—his skin is jet black—that she was schooled across the street by the nuns at St. Charles Church.
Everyone is different from everyone else. No one stands out which means we all fit in.
Except for the drama unfolding on the sidewalk twenty feet away. A bearded, disheveled antiquity of a man is lost in his own head. His raggedy body contorts itself as he twists and turns in tight circles. His heavy jacket is tattered. His pants caked with dirt.
His gaunt, hungry frame upsets my stuffed belly. There is a shame, a humiliation, that comes with witnessing a human collapse.
Everyone looks away or moves away. I gobble my food faster.
