Divine Providence

CAV
14 Imperial Place
Providence, RI 02903
401-751-9164

It is a strange and curious thing to experience the loss of something good. I was back in Providence, RI this past weekend for the alma mater's commencement and graduation festivities, and apart from the requisite getting wastyfaced and making an ass of myself in front of parents and professors alike - I also said what could be one final goodbye in a series of drawn-out farewells to some of my favourite places in Providence, one of which perhaps deserves a special mention.

On Saturday night my friend Reed's parents took me out to dinner at my favourite restaurant in Providence - a place called CAV. By way of background: CAV is a gem of a restaurant which is housed in what used to be an abandoned warehouse in the jewelry district, and also operates as an antique store. The name stands for “Coffee, Antiques, Victuals”, which for some reason still seems to elicit a smile from me to this day, even though I have been privy to that information for quite some time now. Everything in the restaurant - from the Venetian chandeliers to the tablecloths with the beautiful Native American prints - is for sale. The place is decorated with warm colours and bathed in lighting that is part sunset over water and part glowing embers. And the food, good god, the food. It is executed with the highest level of technical mastery but also with the utmost devotion and dedication. It is good food, done well, done with pride, care and - dare I say it - love. In summary, i have a huge boner for CAV.

(Side note: you will all be happy to note that I was extremely well-mannered at dinner and did not once reference any achievement of orgasm in my pantaloons, which itself may or may not have happened. Twice.)

We got to meet the owner - a matronly old lady wearing a long necklace of mismatched beads and a flowy black dress, her face wrinkled not by the passing of time but by her constant smile. She moved slowly but with purpose, her eyes by contrast constantly dancing across the room. As she comes to our table Reed's mum touches her arm and asks, "Do you own this place?"

She stops and sizes us up, then replies without a trace of irony, "No. It owns me."

She proceeds to tell us how and why she started the restaurant - as an act of defiance against stuffy fine dining in general and a denouncement of large, impersonal places with millions of different forks and glasses and an extended hierarchy of waiters and servers. One is never rushed through one's meal at CAV, they always let you sit for as long as you want, sipping and talking and picking at your plate. You can laugh as loud as you want. It is, and I quote her, "a port in the storm of everyday life". That, friends, I think is truer than you could ever imagine.

My point is, if you ever find yourselves in Providence - or back in Providence for some among you - please do yourselves a favour and bring somebody you love to CAV. As you may or may not know I eat out quite a fair bit, and to borrow a metaphor few other restaurants have ever come close to being a refuge from the noise and the confusion and the drudgery of the world. There is a bit in A Moveable Feast where Ernest Hemingway describes eating oysters and drinking white wine at his favourite restaurant after a long, draining day. He writes, "I lost the empty feeling and began to be happy and make plans." That is exactly how I feel when I eat at CAV.

The irony of it all is that my second favourite restaurant in Providence (which I also visited this past weekend) is exactly the kind of sprawling, oak-paneled, dimly-lit restaurant with white tablecloths and a million different forks that takes itself very seriously. You might even call it the antithesis of CAV. It is called Mill's Tavern, and it is fucking amazing.