The above image I found on a Facebook page. It brings back fond memories of when I went to The Kitchen Club in the late ’80s and early ’90s. There’s a whole Facebook group dedicated to remembering The Kitchen Club of back in the day, The Kitchen Club Miami 1980s-1990s. Bar Nancy and other South Florida nightclubs have tribute nights to The Kitchen Club.
Mr. Skeptical interrupts, “Yeah, it was a great night out for everybody else, but you managed to get kicked out. I want to hear that story?”
I stare at Mr. Skeptical sitting across from me while I write this. He sees everything I write except when I use italics, like now. He’s like white on rice. I can’t get rid of him. Every time I write, he shows up criticizing and hounding me, trying to pry into my personal life. “I’ll get to the night where I got kicked out. But first, I want to show another pic of The Kitchen Club I found online.”
I’m unsure which pic is more accurate or when one was taken compared to the other. However, the second pic, the one with graffiti, seems more like The Kitchen Club, I remember.
The club played music like The Cure, Depeche Mode, Nine Inch Nails, New Order, and 80’s New Wave. Best of all, they had slam dancing going on. Slam dancing, or moshing, is a form of punk rock dancing where people intentionally collide with one another.
I enjoyed slam dancing because it reminded me of playing football. I’d played football in grade school through high school and barely managed one year of college football, where I got hurt. Slam dancing simply brought up good feelings and nostalgia for aggressive physical contact.
Mr. Skeptical interrupts again, “So you liked slam dancing because you failed at playing college football.”
Did I mention that Mr. Skeptical is an asshole? “I tore my ACL ligament playing college football, and I figured I wouldn’t go far, so I quit playing. I wouldn’t say I failed.”
“Yeah, sure. I guess warming the bench wasn’t enough for you. Whatever.” He says this while stroking back his hair. His thumb and index finger are in the form of an L. Prick!
Anyway, the night I got kicked out of The Kitchen Club, I was with a chiropractic school fraternity brother named Laurent Nappee. We went to chiropractic school in Texas, and he was visiting Miami for the first time. As his name sounds, he’s French.
At that time, I was in the middle of chiropractic school, which was very difficult, and I was stressed out and studying like crazy. I had little opportunity to go out in Texas because chiropractic school took up all my time. In-between semester breaks and visiting family and friends in Miami, I tended to party like crazy, making up for weekends spent studying in Texas.
I also started to listen to a radio station (yes, people listened to radio stations back then) called The Edge in Dallas. The station played alternative rock. I liked the music, but growing up in Miami, I was into Freestyle Music. A high school friend named Remy Palacios made it big with the group Nice and Wild and their massive hit, “Diamond Girl”. So, alternative rock was new for me, and I didn’t fit in with the alternative rock crowd.
This all reached a climax at Kitchen Club.
The night I got kicked out of Kitchen Club was the first time there for Laurent and me. Seeing others slam dancing brought up my glory days playing high school football, so of course, I wanted to participate. I was dressed in preppy-looking shorts and a polo shirt. I didn’t fit in. This became apparent when I started to slam dance.
Moshing that night were primarily young men moving around in a circle and slamming into one another. At first, I was having a ball. I slammed into a few people, getting that adrenaline rush, reminding me of sacking a quarterback. Meanwhile, my French friend Laurent watched me in the mosh pit, likely thinking,’ These freaking Americans are nuts.’
However, soon things started to change, and many guys were beginning to wallop me, often using the elbow to slam into me. At first, it was stimulating. I was the center of attention. I used to read Conan novels, and I imagined myself as the barbarian fighting off foes.
But it soon got ugly.
One guy went high with his elbow, hitting and bruising my nose.
“But I want to add that you have a big nose.” I stare daggers at Mr. Skeptical. He shrugs and adds, “The big nose got in the way.”
Big nose or not, getting hit in the nose only motivated me to slam back harder. This encouraged the other young men in the mosh pit to attack me back harder, and they started to gang up on me. Here I was in prep shorts with a polo shirt, yet most of these guys were dressed in black, tattooed, pierced, mean-looking, and likely knew each other. Somebody had a steel elbow because I had a bruised head too.
I was alone, dancing and getting beat up.
Nevertheless, the bouncers came to me and kicked me out.
“They did the smart thing. You didn’t fit in. I wouldn’t have let you in the club, to begin with.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence.”
Mr. Skeptical sardonically smiles back.
I often returned to the Kitchen Club after that incident, but I dressed better for the occasion and didn’t slam dance as aggressively, for I didn’t want to get kicked out again. Besides, there were other alluring and more peaceful distractions, like beautiful women to look at and talk to.
You can read more from Hermann at www.SubconsciousFat.com.
