By Molly Sanchez
Dear Chevys Fresh Mex,
It’s me again. I know you knew I’d come back, I always seem to. I heard about you the other day. Remember that crazy night back in 2011 when I signed up for your dedicated emails? “Come on baby,” you said over my fourth basket of chips. “What are you? Afraid of commitment?” So I signed up, mainly because you promised me free flautas. I was always your little flautas whore wasn’t I? I had high hopes for our level of commitment, for the occasional margarita flavor update, maybe some free guac on my birthday. Who knew that your latest email would be the one to tell me you were gone forever (from San Francisco, anyway).
Anyway, I guess we’re finally through. After all these years of wild nights followed by disappointment I finally found a way to quit you. No, you will not find me crawling to South San Francisco for a fix. I won’t show up at that doorstep looking for a “Mexican Bulldog” and sympathy. I don’t care if you rolled out the cranberry flavor for Thanksgiving. I’m done for good.
You were always bad for me. Even before I was 21 you fucked with my system. I remember the day we first met, in ’09 after improv practice at the Stonestown Mall. Someone dared me to drink 17 shots of your fuego sauce. Well I did and then I chased it with your bland ass enchiladas. It felt good in the moment but not later, when I woke up with a stomach ache from a dream about you.
A sane person wouldn’t go back again, but what can I say? I’ve always wanted what was worst for me.
So I came back, this time because you invited me for drinks. And then I kept coming back, downing gallons of margaritas in seasonal flavors that had tiny Coronas puking into them at various intervals. God those nights were good. You’d give me all the chips and salsa I could stuff into my face and all the tacky ass drinks I could guzzle. I laughed, I cried, I ordered shitty flautas again, and the next day I felt fat and hungover and poor.
But that ends now. We’re done. This city is full of Mexican restaurants, decent ones even, that won’t do me dirty like you did. Sure, I may never get to drink another gigantic margarita with a beer in it, but I’m older and wiser now and maybe I’m done with such things. I’ll find a new place, a better place.
Every now and then I’ll remember you fondly, Chevys, whenever I smell vomit and seasonal margaritas on the wind.
Thanks for the memories,
Molly
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