My news feed for a week and a half: Two most recent issues of Time, front to back, two issues of Newsweek, front to back, most of NPR (radio/online), most of BBC (online), and FOX (television/online).
What I’ve learned: Apparently, our world will catch fire soon from global warming, our children will grow up and find no jobs and die young, the economy is falling into some sort of black hole, and there could, quite possibly, be aliens out in space who want to destroy us.
This all got me thinking…How many shits can one person give? Apparently it was one more than my quota, so I flipped tracks and picked up Esquire, the vainest of men’s magazines. Lo and behold, an article on the best bars of America. And behold again, Milwaukee made the list with Holler House (2042 W. Lincoln Ave.). If ever there was a time for a drink.
Holler House has a major attractant: it’s the oldest bowling alley in the United States, opened in 1908, with two lanes still tended by pinsetters and the original wooden floorboards lain more than a century ago. Interestingly, the right wall of the alley is a recent addition, erected after the old one collapsed around five years ago. It was all set to be re-sided but people started signing it. So, it was left as is, and is now a collage of names and messages from around the world.
The beauty of this job (job? task? social disorder?) is the people I get to meet, and always over the commonality of alcohol, the great equalizer, which makes everyone wonderful until it makes everyone terrible.
There is almost nothing remarkable about Holler House (besides the bowling alley, and if you’re only drinking, you won’t see much of). No tap beer, minimal selection of hard liquor, odd decorations that made it look more like a pizza parlor than a bar.
But the people…people can make all the difference.
I had the distinct pleasure of sharing a drink with the owner, the very elderly Marcy Skowronski, and her daughter, Sharon. Now, I’ve met a lot of people in my bar hopping, and most of them are pretty great. But I can say, without reserve, that Marcy and Sharon are the two greatest.
Holler House was all very simple. We laughed, shared a couple drinks and horror stories from travel, talked politics and state, movies and entertainment. The poignant truth to the place is that Marcy is a host to her guests. Let me restate that for any bar owner or tender that may have lost this notion along the way: You are a host. A great many times have I walked into establishments that offer up glares bordering on anger, as if I’ve walked into a church wearing swimming trunks.
Marcy though, and Sharon, too, know that to host a bar (own a bar; tend a bar) is to welcome the people that come into it, to make them feel like they’re wanted not just for money or to fill a stool. And that’s really what bars are about, because in the end we’re all just people with a little alcohol, becoming far too liberal with our stories.
