Pandora’s Box
I live about four blocks from Lake City Way in Seattle. Every city has roads like Lake City Way, industrial thoroughfares with used car lots, ethnic grocery stores, ramshackle bars, and, at this is Seattle, cannabis stores. Luckily, I live just far enough away to be insulated from all the road noise, but it does mean I spend a lot of time on Lake City Way on my way from a to b.
When I first moved to my house 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, a kind of shop local strategy.
But then the Seattle Police Department ran a sting operation and, it turns out, he was the accountant for a local mobster and they both went to jail. Now that’s not to say he still wouldn’t have been willing to do my taxes but the idea had lost quite a bit of the allure.
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 on the road. This was considered a great moral victory by the mayor, but time 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 head died down, the mobster’s family reopened his strip club. So, the net-net of the SPD sting was Lake City Way now has three strip clubs where it once had two.
I drive past Pandora’s Box pretty much every time I use the road. 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 those people but I’m pretty sure 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 that myself.” That was, of course, Leo Kottke. I suspect the dancers are battling a similar angst before they talk themselves back into the club.
Now when I come home from the gym Pandora’s Box is open for lunch business. Just like church, all the attendees park in the back of the lot, apparently working under the theory that if you can’t see their car from the road, then they aren’t there. But there is often 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 all the intention 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, I suspect a retiree frequenting a strip club that he can walk to would rank right up there. Besides, I enjoy it enough vicariously!
