Piano Keys and Spilled Shots

Piano Keys and Spilled ShotsPiano Keys and Spilled Shots A Galveston Love LetterA Galveston Love Letter By Robert Dean

THERE’S A SLIGHT, BEAUTIFUL CHAOS PERCOLATING PAST THE WATERS CRASHING

AGAINST THE SEAWALL. It’s out of sight, but it exists. While the tourists parade past Pleasure Pier’s Ferris wheel, stopping for a chicken sandwich down at Chick-a-fil, they’re unaware of what’s happening once the sand stops and the concrete begins.

Galveston is a city of dive bars. This is not the place if you’re looking for sexy, sweaty nights on the dance floor to a thumping Dua Lipa beat. Instead, it’s a beach town where chatting about the mysteries of the human experience is normal bar talk, just the same as smelling the magnolias bloom as you drunk stumble from Island Pier Club to Denny’s for a late-night Moons Over My Hammy. Here, no one cares if you’ve got a BMW or wearing a Rolex, and if you are, the next round is on you. No one is chasing status but trying to find their best chance at a life. That’s why the locals celebrate their Born on The Island (BOI) status. Galveston is a place of contrasting big money hotels, and the quiet streets of the east side of the city, which create a specific attitude, something that locals extol, no matter if they arrived last week or twenty years back. Pirates found this place, and a little of their blood is still in the water, making it acrid yet sweet. It takes a certain kind of person to love Galveston, to seek out the lore, to dare to find its best places for a beer at sunset, or where to grab a whiskey with that cute bartender you met from the hotel who just got off their shift.

Galveston is a working-class town with a history as rich as any other area lauded for its culture and social identity. Still, the thing about that culture is to lie back and let life happen at its own pace rather than chase the dragon of “LOOK AT US, WE’RE SO FUN.” Galveston should be kept like a bird in the hands of those who love it. It’s a special place that doesn’t puff up its chest, daring visitors to soak it in; instead, it’s a take it or leave it attitude, but if you’d like to have a tall boy along the way, that’s cool, too.

My Galveston is drinks at O’Malley’s in the daytime with bartenders chatting up the local gossip, talking a little shit, complaining about this or that over a Ruben as the daywalkers outside depart from the cruise terminals or make their oil and gas deals an hour north up in Houston. My Galveston is wandering the back streets on a sleepy Tuesday night when no one is out but us, looking for a slice of adventure. When I come to town, you’ll find me strumming guitars with Derek

Anderson, my friend who’s one of the best local artists in the zip code. We buy cheap bottles of wine and argue about the Beatles or Stones, then traipse over to Cellar Bar to harass Mike Snow. We put on Elmore James and let the nights fade into memories, one pour of Jameson at a time. We’ll meet local weirdos along the way and promise to “not make it a late night.” And then, as the script promises, we always do. God knows how many hangover smoothies I’ve bought from Lolo Kai.

Downtown is where I wander, and I usually stay off Church Street. Just close enough where I can make my way home at all hours, but always see my people behind the bar. I’ve hoisted many a drink at the Albatross, where some of the island’s most interesting locals slap their bucks on the Formica, ready for another one. I’ll grab a bar steak at Jack’s, where I’ll be covered in cigarette smoke, and immediately need a shower when I get back to my room. I love a quiet drink with fishermen over at Press Box to cut up with local legend Joey who keeps a tight ship on who walks through his door.

When I was still married, my wife took me down to Galveston. It was somewhere she’d grown up coming with her dad. We’d made a few trips over the years as a couple, but I couldn’t get the island out of my ichor when we separated. Since then, it’s become the place to get my head straight, to figure my shit out when everything feels like an evermoving gordian knot that only gets harder to unravel with life’s problems. I come here to self-solve, to flush out the bullshit of being an adult. Galveston’s slow pace and non-expectant attitude give me a shot in the arm I need as a person. Somehow, a few late-night beach walks or a few bottles of PBR over at Sandy’s Country Store mend the soul in ways I can’t calculate. Then, I pack up my black VW SUV and head home to Austin, nourished. I don’t know what spell Galveston has on me, but I know it means something.

Every August, I come alone for my birthday. I’m not looking for chaos, but it finds me in subtle ways, just wanted as a gift from the back streets of Avenue O or over by Henry’s on Broadway. I’ll get dinner and accept that I’m a year older. Despite the intrigue of the shores of a different sea, this place always demands I come to celebrate that small milestone, even if it’s just another day on the calendar. Maybe one year, someone will come with me. Till then, I’m ok browsing the shelves of the used bookstore or stopping for a song or two over the Old Quarter. Galveston is a city of secrets, a language spoken in hushed tones between the sheets. While people on the mainland might have snarky things to say about “the water being dirty” or a “ghetto little island,” that’s fine; that’s exactly what they should be saying. Keep going to Corpus Christi or down to South Padre, and I’m all for it. Keep saying bad things about the little strip of land that hurricanes love to crash into. Keep spending your time where you can see the crystal-clear water with the white sand. Totally cool with me. Go get that blueberry mojito, baby. If I’m gonna do shots and look at the water, I’m good doing it to Black Flag’s “Rise Above” at the Library Bar. Everyone thinks the city is just a window to the Gulf of Mexico when instead, there are many watering holes in town with a cavalcade of characters all too willing to dance till they holler Last Call and cut the music. It’s up to you how you choose your poison in this ragged heart of a town.