Fast food restaurants are a common sight. Even in the small city we live in now, they’re all over the place. There is one restaurant that’s difficult to find — although not impossible — and that’s Fazoli’s. And while American and Mexican fast food places are popular, Fazoli’s is unique in that they exclusively serve Italian fast food.
Now, depending on who you ask, labelling it “Italian” might get you into a minor argument, or maybe a fist fight. While full-blooded Italians consider using “Olive Garden” and “Italian food” in the same sentence as an affront to their very existence, it must be even more so in a restaurant whose servers wear a plastic name tag and deliver your food in ten minutes or less.
A lifetime ago, when I was going to college for the first time, I did not yet have my driver’s license, so my grandpa picked me up in the afternoon when class let out. And each time he did, he would take me to Fazoli’s for lunch. If I got my love of pasta from anyone, it was him. As a runner, he was a firm believer in the importance of carbs. The fact that pasta is frickin’ delicious certainly didn’t hurt. So yeah, we had pasta a lot.
My grandpa was 100%, full-blooded Sicilian. He was proud of his heritage, so the mere mention of “Italian fast food” should have offended him. It didn’t; he just loved pasta. He didn’t care. If it was delicious, he ate it. And Fazoli’s was delicious. Going there after school with him is one of my fondest memories, where he would have spaghetti and meatballs and I would have ravioli.
I’m tearing up just writing this. I miss him very much. But there’s a lesson here, I think: nothing is deserving of our condescension. Everything, even simple things, or maybe especially simple things, are worthy of love. Certainly, it’s only because of my grandpa’s love and acceptance of such a simple thing as Italian fast food that I have cherished memories that will last a literal lifetime.
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