“1546” is an address on the sign. Framed in painted-chipped earthy green, it’s a perfect invitation for an early modern historical interpreter. (Must have been a good year, right there in the core of the sixteenth century. If it wasn’t visited by a plague of locusts.) Mezzrow’s might be the perfect bar – at least perfect in a Toronto-heart-of-Parkdale kind of way. The ugly-beautiful sign beckons only those who are able to see.
Wonders sometimes come in the dark, in the deeply dim. It’s not gloom. There are too many thriving plants (how?) in Mezzrow’s – too many unwashed ponytails, too many punk country chicks, too many vital nooks and crannies for exiles on main street – to call the atmo gloomy. The wood is dark reddish brownish, true. But there’s all the multi-coloured books, the ricochet of shelves. And there are oil paintings, textures inviting other senses. Feels calm and right. Cozy. Sounds like? The murmur of talk and laughter. And up, a layer higher, the west coast game of Hockey Night in Canada streams. It’s always on, flashing by on two televisions, either fifteen-years-old or unnaturally small. There’s a bartender named Jason. He is also perfect. Because Jason knows. He doesn’t need telling.
Whatever would appear, if the lights ever came on . . . it wouldn’t be Mezzrow’s.
Kenneth Mills 
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