Encinitas Table Five

  Meet Gregorio, He resembles a  Santa Claus, though without the beard. A perpetual smile covers his large rotund face. Why you almost might wish to sit on his lap. He looks like any Jewish Russian, but with high cheek bone.  
   Today at Table 5  at the little Oak's Cafe, Lady Barbara, the diminutive royal lady whose roots go far back to the  Salem witch hunting days. The small thin damsel sits demurely laughing and speaks about a dream that she had. The significance of that dream I will speak about later. I began to call her Lady Barbara ever since I discovered she was linked to the sixth wife of Henry the Eight,  Catherine Parr. 
   Back to Gregorio now, his band once played for Joseph Stalin, or uncle Joe as we called him. He like the others at this table are in their mid-eighties. In the Ukraine, he also sang and played the clarinet. Today he swayed into the senior cafe singing out loud. Love was in the air and reached a soaring pitch when he took a gander at  Lady Barbara .
    As mentioned before, Lady Barbara is a descendant of Catherine Parr, the sixth wife of Henry the Eighth. The diminutive one always smiles no matter how much her back hurts. His Santa Claus smile told me he had to sit next to Barbara. . His large cheeks came from hours of blowing horns. Lady Barbara spoke about a dinner date with him. I changed seats with him.
   "We went to downtown San Diego. I couldn't speak a word of Russian, but was smart enough to laugh every time Gregorio did. I danced by myself to music played by a guitar player. I never have had so much fun and the food was out of this world."
   "God bless America. Land of the free..."  The Mad Russian belted out the song several times. His voice took all of us by surprise. But that is what too much Vodka and love will do for your. (It had been  their third date.)
   Tomas began to shake and laugh. He had just returned from the hospital, but was himself again. Nothing breeds laughter than more laughter. Abe the printer sat down followed by Horst Cahn, last living survivor of an Auschwitz rubber.  camp Tomas had immigrated to the United States  from Italy. Abe worked his life as a printer.The last to take a seat was Horst Cahn, no relation to Genghis. 
  "George, I want to tell you something I first learned to bake pastries in Essen Germany. And here in Cardiff, people came from as far away to sample my cheesecakes.  They were not too fluffy or too hard, but just right. One Christmas, I sold five hundred of them. People came from all over San Diego. Even Santa Claus dropped in for a bite."  
   "God Bless America..." Gregorio, can't you wait for Horst to finish?"
   At that point, I filled their wine  glasses with more apple juice. Gregorio spilled his over my pants. I asked Horst if he had had his a Bar Mitzva in Essen, Germany . 
   'Yes, when I was thirteen and just before the Germans took us away to Buna and Auschwitz. I saw the same rabbi later in New York on Park Avenue. I went up to him but he made me mad."
   "Horst, if you wish money, the answer is 'no.'." I felt disgusted and told him my bakery was doing well. I was living in Rochester and felt upset my playmate and his daughter in Essen had passed away. 
  At that point the Mayor of Encinitas dropped in. She would raffle off four $25 Spouts coupons. I excused myself and soon after drove back to the Old Town commuter parking lot. 
  I may have not won the raffle, but my door prize was and will always be Table 5. Yet an update on the Mad Russian. He left this earth through the fiftieth gate a few days ago in May of 2014. The joy from his voice will be lost  forevermore...Yet somehow I think the mad Jewish Russian is still singing "God Bless America" in heaven.