I grew up a few blocks from Romanelli's. It'd been years since I'd eaten there, so the moment I walked in the front door I was struck by nostalgia. I'd usually gone there with my parents.

My dad was a fish salesman, and every day after work he "stopped off" at Romanelli's for a couple of cold ones. I can still hear my mom shouting at my dad from the kitchen as he left for work each day, "Come straight home after work. No stopping off at Romanelli's."

"I won't," he'd say. But he always did.

He parked his red Impala behind the restaurant, just in case my mom happened to drive down the street.

From a barstool, my dad tried to convince the owner, Joe McCabe, that he should put catfish on the menu. Joe wasn't interested, until one day my dad brought in fresh catfish. Dad walked into the kitchen, put on an apron, fried up a catfish and served it to Joe. It was my dad's most memorable, and talked about, sale. Romanelli's has been the Holy Grail of catfish ever since.

It was about 5 the night I arrived, and the place was crowded with my parents' generation. I had planned to order to go, but decided to stay and eat -- I realized that my hunger might not have been for catfish but for soulful food.

I couldn't help overhearing conversations, voices decibels above normal speaking range. Two couples in the booth in front of me talked about a friend who had died. The husband joked that when his time came, his wife would have no problem pulling the plug.

The couple in the booth behind me talked about their friend who met an old boyfriend at her class reunion. They fell in love. She divorced her husband and the couple married.

One woman commented about a friend's appearance, "I know she's had some work done to her face."

The couple to the right of me scrutinized their bill and fought over what to tip the waitress.

These were my parents, I thought -- every one of them. I asked the waitress for a glass of Chardonnay. What's the rush, I thought. The waitress was sorry for the delay; it must have taken 15 minutes from the time I sat down until the time she served me.

The catfish sizzled on the plate. Ahhh -- just how I remembered it. I slathered on the tartar sauce. Mmmm. My parents are both deceased, but being there, surrounded by their generation, brought back so many memories.

I looked into the bar one more time. A man struck a match, and it lit another memory: the time my brother was walking home from school and saw our dad's car parked in its usual spot. He went inside and asked for a ride.

Dad looked at him as if he were a stranger.

"I'm sorry. I think you have mistaken me for someone else," he said. After several minutes of trying to convince him that they were indeed related, my brother walked away confused and thinking maybe the guy at the bar wasn't Dad.

Our mother was a diminutive 5 feet tall and 100 pounds, but people feared her, including our dad. He wasn't about to confess to anyone that he'd "stopped off" at Romanelli's after work.

Occasionally I see a faded bumper sticker on a car that asks, "Where the hell is Romanelli's?"

My dad sure knew -- and so did my mom.

To find out more about Mimi Kopulos, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators website at www.creators.com.
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