Pandora’s Box¹
I live about four blocks from Lake City Way in Seattle. Every big city has roads like Lake City Way, industrial thoroughfares full of used car lots, ethnic grocery stores, ramshackle bars, and, this being Seattle, cannabis stores. Luckily, I live far enough away to be insulated from the road noise but close enough that I spend a lot of time on Lake City Way on my way from a to b.
When I first moved here there was an accountant’s office at the intersection of my street and Lake City Way. I had it in the back of my mind to maybe stop in and see if he’d be interested in doing my taxes, in the spirit of shop local.
But then the Seattle Police Department ran a sting operation and, it turns out, he was the accountant for a local mobster. Now that’s not to say he still wouldn’t have been willing to do my taxes but the idea lost quite a bit of the allure. Both the mobster and the accountant went to jail.
One byproduct of the arrest was the city closed down the strip club that the mobster ran on Lake City Way. It was one of two such clubs on the road. This was considered a great moral victory by the mayor, but the world of supply and demand marches on, and, when a Chinese restaurant about five blocks from my house closed on Lake City Way, it was resurrected as a strip club called Pandora’s Box. When the heat died down, the mobster’s family reopened his strip club too. So, the net-net of the SPD sting was Lake City Way has three strip clubs where it once had two.
I drive past Pandora’s Box pretty much every time I use the Lake City Way. It’s on the way to my gym.
If I go to the gym early, I’ll often see the cleaning crew finishing up. Not sure what they pay the cleaning crew but I’m confident it’s not enough. Just close your eyes and visualize cleaning a strip club!
If I go slightly later, I’ll often see the dancers sneaking a smoke before steeling themselves for another working day. It reminds me of a story I heard about Leo Kottke, the twelve string guitarist, just as he was starting to hit it big. A friend of mine heard he was playing at a little bar in St. Paul, and he went down there to see Leo. At the door of the bar was a guy having a smoke, my friend asked, “Is it worth it?” and the guy replied, “I was just thinking about that myself.” That was, of course, Leo Kottke. I suspect the dancers are battling a similar existential angst before they talk themselves into the club.
When I come home from the gym, Pandora’s Box is open for lunch business. Just like church, the lot fills from back to front, under the theory that if you can’t see their car from the road, then they aren’t there. But there is one car that brazenly parks right at the front door. It piques my interest because it’s a car with a bike rack and one bike on the rack. I wonder about the back story. Does he tell his wife he’s off for a bike ride and then spends an hour at the strip club? Or does he leave with good intentions of going for a bike ride, but he just can’t fight the temptation as he drives past the club? Or did he go for a bike ride in the morning, and this is his reward to himself?
I’ve never been in Pandora’s. In a world full of poor lifestyle choices, a retiree frequenting a strip club that he can walk to would rank right up there. Still, I get some vicarious pleasure just from monitoring the parking lot.
¹ Okay, it’s not called Pandora’s Box, it’s just Pandora’s. It should be though.
