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In Search of an Honest Meal

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Written by Thom Ring

I finally found Charlie’s Diner!

Well, one of them. And I didn’t really find it, someone found it for me. But let me bask in my success in any case, because discovery is one of the charms of the Mom ‘N Pop Culture.

There was no special magic, mind you, about Charlie’s Diner. My quest had more to do with my destination. At least a few times each year I’d find myself on the way up to the Eastern States Exhibition grounds in West Springfield, Mass., to participate in shows related to the racing-trade. I used to publish a small racing magazine that covered the sport here in New England, you see.

Once the shows started I was a slave to my booth, but after setting up the day before a show I’d have a little time to meander back to my Rhode Island home. What better way to spend a bit of it than by tucking in to lunch at a local diner. Yet I still was a babe in the woods of diner exploration. I’d google "diners" and "Springfield, Mass.," and get a couple of names. And the one that would catch my attention would be Charlie’s, right there in West Springfield.

West Springfield is not big. The first time I went on my hunt I was arrogant enough to believe I could just drive to West Springfield and stumble my way onto it. A trip to the White Hut burger stand was the result.

On future trips I did not fare much better. Even with an address I was lost, because the maps I find online leave much to be desired. And truth to tell, this never was a priority. I was caught up in the bad marriage of trying to keep above water the tiny head of my at-first promising but ultimately foundering enterprise.

The last show I did, I planned to scour a part of town where I hadn’t headed before and then give up. I already was assuming that the diner long ago had given way to a Chinese restaurant. One right near the fairgrounds certainly appeared to be a Lou Roc winner. I was 90-percent sure it was the gravesite of Charlie’s. Besides, I’d noticed the rest areas on the westbound side of the Mass Pike offered food from Fresh City and Boston Market. Either was at least tolerable. And I was working here; this wasn’t supposed to be a joyride. Time is money, and all that.

The best I did that day was to resort to the backup choice of my diner quest. I found the Route 66 Diner in Springfield, but I knew by the time I found it that it’d be closed, for it was after 2 pm. So I headed for the Pike, an at-least digestible lunch, and home.

And found that every eastbound rest area offered only a lone McDonald’s for - ahem! - dining.

This frosted me for a couple of reasons. First of all, I simply was angry at the apparent lack of thought involved in giving westbound Pikers the choice of two of the better fast-food outlets and eastbound drivers only arguably one of the worst. On reflection, I started to boil over the possibility that this was not a product of sloppy thinking at all but possibly of diabolical market-research. Perhaps McDonald’s had determined that eastbound travelers were farther from their points of departure and thus more likely hungrier.

I also found myself angry at myself ("But Grasshopper, all anger is at oneself.") for my poor planning. Yes, I’d gotten out to the "Big E", set up my booth and all its accouterments with efficiency and would be on duty in the morning for my non-stop 13-hour shift. But I’d failed at the seemingly trivial task of finding a diner for lunch.

A lot of coffee has flowed under my nose since the last time I worked a trade show at the Big E or anywhere else. My daughter Marcy now is pursuing her master’s at Springfield College. I helped bring her up right, for she soon had scouted out the most interesting places to eat in the city. The magazine succumbed to the impact of the Great Recession. And now I’ve racheted back my high-energy approach to being a big success. Instead I’ve taken to heart the advice I once read that the key to a good life is not how much money I need before I can live how I want to, but how little I need and how I can use what I have to live how I want to now.

These days my visits to Springfield are made so I can enjoy some time together with Marcy. Now when I go to the Big E it’s to enjoy the big fair held each year, something I’d never done before. And I’ve learned that if I’d simply slowed down a bit more before those trade shows and headed home along Route 20, which parallels the Pike, I would have discovered dozens of promising places to eat.

I also discovered Roadside Online, where I learned that there actually are three Charlie’s Diners in Massachusetts, and the one in West Springfield, which actually is Charles’s Diner, is located on Union St., less than two miles from the Big E (for details and a picture look it up on the Diner Finder).

Marcy and her fiance James took me there last weekend. If you go, get something with ham. They bake it there and hand-carve it.

And don’t get lazy like me. Hunt for the good stuff. Don’t settle for the easy choices market-research creates for you. After all, the best cooks are busy cooking.