One morning late in 2020 ( ’tis strange to speak of 2020 in the past tense) Jo and I woke up thinking about Juan in a Million. We hadn’t been there in years, hadn’t spoken about it, and here were our separate thoughts returning to this place on exactly the same morning. So we gathered the kids and went over for breakfast.
The Don Juan breakfast taco is a culinary masterpiece. I had my first taste of it in the late 80’s. Robert introduced me to the place and we’d drive up in his art car, a massive 70’s behemoth hand-painted all over in what could have been scenes from Dead’s Terrapin Station. It was my dad’s favorite breakfast joint when he was in Austin. And Arjun’s too. Jo and I ate here almost weekly before her childbirth induced egg allergy. Vivian nibbled her first Don Juan on the hip of a waitress in the kitchen. Michelle almost got her photo on the Wall for putting away one and half Don Juan tacos a couple of decades ago.
Juan was a young man with a hearty handshake when I first met him. I tried to convince him to run for Mayor. His kids were teenagers when they started behind the counter, greeting guests shyly in the shadow of their dad. Juan walked around every table and asked if the everything came out okay. He enquired about family and how everyone was doing. For two bucks you got the biggest baddest breakfast taco along with the firmest handshake in town and a heaping of friendly chatter.
Juan wasn’t behind the counter when we went there last month. He owns most of the block now so he’s hopefully enjoying life somewhere. One of his sons was running the cash machine, his own man now. He asks why we haven’t been by in a decade. The waitress is our waitress from 20 years ago. She remembers Vivian as a baby. Nothing has changed in 20 years.
Except everything has.
Jo and I aren’t holding hands and kissing between bites of breakfast tacos anymore : – ). There isn’t a line of hungry gringos snaking around the one story nondescript building waiting to get in. Everyone inside who isn’t eating is wearing a mask. Oh, and the country is presided over by a pyschopath. It’s been a few days since the Capitol coup. And Trump isn’t behind bars. He was asked to freely swear to do one fucking thing, just one fucking thing. Defend the constitution. He scorched the earth that the constitution was written on. He pissed on the graves of the founding fathers. He really really fucked up. And he did it without any consequences (a second impeachment is a badge of honor for the moron).
His cult of zombies follow his every word looking for a deeper grander message. Wake the fuck up. He’s lying to you. You have been radicalized. Get some perspective. Get out of the hell where you’ve locked yourself for the last five years. Outside, you’ll find a more joyful, truthful, caring, and diverse world of opinions and people. And facts. We need you. Unless the country is split up and we never have to see each other again, we have to live together. You and I mostly want the same things. There isn’t a socialist pedophile elitist election-fraudifying pandemic-peddling conspiracy out there. Just others like you and me.
As for the other Republicans who aren’t programmed zombies, you got your deal. The Supreme Court is conservative for the imaginable future and in return the devil has your soul for eternity. You’re hell is looking at yourself in the mirror every morning. Remember when you asked American muslims after 9/11 to denounce the crazy Islamists loudly and publicly? Unless they did that, you said they were traitors and jihadists. You are them now. Get out and distance yourself from the madman. May be they will forgive you even if you didn’t forgive them.
The Don Juan is everything I remember. I guess some things stayed the same.
Notes from Dad 
Oh man, I miss y’all. You are always so on target. Just listening to, what looked like normal people you might see on the street as they were interviewed, was like a nightmare from which you want to awaken. Please keep posting. You are a beacon of sanity in the wilderness.
Peace,
Jennifer
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