Cowboy Confessional

A memorial service for an Iranian was held in an Irish pub today … and, no, that is not the opening line to a bad joke.

The San Francisco bay area is filled with walking contradictions as well as unbridled expectations for happiness. Reza Honarkhah was both. Reza fled Iran in 1979 as theocratic insanity consumed Persia. 30 years later he finished his mortal tour tending bar at McGrath’s Irish Pub in Alameda. This thin fellow – with a mustache that easily outweighed the rest of his body – created around him what he had left behind in Iran; a family.

The one he left in Tehran has been hard to reach lately and still may not know of his passing.

McGrath’s was an odd place for Reza to land work. McGrath’s is the Bay Area’s home for that genre of music known as Blue Grass, which Reza called Tennessee Torture. That was part of the man mourned today – that he found humor in all things, even tunes that irritated he senses. The Kentucky Twisters, at Reza’s request, agreed to play in the convalescent home in which Reza was dying, but they arrived a day late.

Someone suggested that Reza knew a banjo was coming and decided to check out early to avoid unnecessary suffering.

Reza invested his humor and overdose of charm on utter strangers. Some half drunk frat boys came into the bar on a night that Reza worked. Being in an Irish pub they asked if Reza knew how to make a drink called an Irish Car Bomb. Reza said “I’m Iranian. I can make any kind of car bomb.”

Little wonder that McGrath’s was packed from backroom to bar’s end today. Reza had an attachment to people and to the string of moments that make up a life. Even the ugly moments.

Reza was a smoker, and in his 50th year the habit caught up with him, eating a hole through his neck from the inside. When a friend stayed with him the first night Reza was in a rehabilitation center, Reza instantly told his pal to “Tell the nurse.” About the fifth time he prodded, Reza’s friend said “I already told them I’m staying here tonight” to which Reza said “No, tell them what size diaper you want.”

Brings a new perspective on laughing to death.

Reza had no state-side family, aside from the hundreds of people who knew and loved him at the bar and who managed to squeeze in there this afternoon. Having survived the bay area’s high cost of living on a barkeep’s pay, Reza’s musical buddies held a couple of fund raiser shows on his behalf. They knew the money would mainly go toward cremation since survival was not an option.

And he passed, as he and we knew he would.

I showed up at the memorial a bit ahead of the mob, side dish in hand, and was surprised when I came in the door. His friend – the one who Reza suggested needed to place a diaper order with the day nurse – was handing out tickets good for free drinks and saying “This is from Reza.” Seems the cost of cremation was a fair bit less than local bands had raised on Reza’s behalf. Since there was no need for cash in Paradise, Reza had to find a use for the money.

So he bought the bar a round.

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This entry was posted by Guy Smith on Sunday, July 19th, 2009 at 4:04 pm and is filed under San Francisco. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.