Strip Club Pizza

A fine dining experience

We own a house.

It’s weird to state such a simple fact and expect contempt, but I’m aware of the increasing impossibility of millennial home ownership, so I anticipate the resentment. Just know there was a mix of struggle, failure, loss, and one rare moment where timing, luck, and planning aligned and resulted in this American accomplishment.

In true millennial fashion, we don’t live in the home we own. Adriana and I rent in LA, where we live, and bought a place in Portland back when it was still affordable, unlike LA, where our budget would have gotten us something closer to a decaying shoebox.

When we met, Adriana had just moved to Portland, and since I couldn’t leave LA, we compromised by building a life here while planting roots there, with the intention of eventually heading north for cleaner air and a slower tempo. Friends of friends lived in the house until recently, and after they moved out, we went up to handle painting, repairs, and all the other fun stuff.

We had a small window of time and a long to-do list, so we were pulling 12 to 14 hour days and living off PB&Js. But that got old, and on the third night, after visiting every Home Depot, Lowe’s, and Ace Hardware within a 30-mile radius of our home, we decided it was time for some real food.

Pizza was the logical choice. Adriana was driving, and she asked me to look up something that took us out of our immediate surroundings, as the Home Depot we had just left was in a very sketchy industrial area surrounded by vacant lots, decaying homes, an impressive number of strip clubs, and an unsightly, endless web of power lines hovering above.

I found a pizza spot eight minutes away. It seemed far enough outside of the darkness we were in, and the reviews were solid. Not a ton of them, but enough to legitimize the choice. I ordered our pizza via their website, and we headed to pick it up.

I noticed that after about five minutes of driving, the scenery was only getting worse, and I was a bit concerned that our pizza was actually eight minutes further into the darkness. But we persisted, eventually pulling into a dark parking lot, staring up at a big roasted red awning with faded letters reading “Bliss” in a seedy, script-like font, which was not the name of the pizza place I ordered from.

Adriana was sketched out, but I was hungry and therefore needed to stay optimistic. I told her to stay in the car, and I went out to find our pizza. I walked the perimeter but found no door in the back, so I walked into the nondescript entrance of “Bliss” to get some help.

In a dark, closet-like lobby with nothing but a counter and a cash register, I found a very large, jovial man standing in front of a jet black door. He was smiling like he had a joke he wanted to tell me.

I asked, “I’m looking for the pizza place around here?”

He smiled even bigger.

“You’re picking up a pizza? Let me check on that for you.”

He pulled open the door and disappeared to the sound of SZA’s chorus on Kendrick’s “luther.” The subs shook the floor.

I waited for a minute or two, then cracked open the door and peeked in. I locked eyes with a skinny twenty-something sliding backward down a pole. There was no one watching her dance. Just a bartender at a long bar situated at the other end of the room, a few guys casually gambling at digital slot machines, and multicolored LED lights ricocheting off the mirrored walls. It was calm. Even meditative. But my trance was broken by the door opening behind me.

“Hey!!”

A young woman in a long trench coat and flip flops stared at me for a response, but I had none. Luckily, the large man returned.

“Hey!!!” He was still brimming with smiles.

“Sorry, it’s my first day. I don’t know what to do!” She giggled.

“Oh, no sweat! It’s mine too. I’m Jake.” He opened the door for her. They were both so happy as he ushered her into the serene temple.

He then returned to me. “That pizza’s just going to be a few more minutes!”

“No problem,” I said.

At that moment, Adriana texted me. The exchange looked like this:

She pictured the darkness, but she had no idea of the light, the positivity just pouring out of this place. She didn’t know about Jake. I wasn’t leaving without this pizza.

A few minutes passed, and another burly, tall man appeared holding my pizza. He handed it to me with a sense of pride. He didn’t have to tell me, but I knew he made this pizza. I knew this was his hustle. I knew the whole story without him saying a word. How he and the owners were boys and definitely went to high school together. And how he was finally done getting high and messing around and was going to put his skills to use, and got permission from his homie to make pizzas in the back of the strip club. I was so proud of him.

I took the pizza back to the car and hopped in.

“We can get you something else if you want, but I’m eating this pizza,” I said to Adriana.

She admitted that it smelled good. We pulled out of “Bliss” and found a church parking lot across from what seemed like an abandoned house, save for the clothes draped over the front porch, like a flag squatters raised to say, “We’re in here.”

I cracked open the pizza box, releasing a glow that filled the car. We took a slice and looked at each other after the first bite. It was, without a doubt, a great slice of pizza. Possibly even the best pizza in Portland.

We housed that whole damn pizza and went home tired and full.

The next day, the schedule was the same. Up at dawn, on our feet all day, barely hanging by a thread by the time dinner rolled around. Another day of PB&Js and another day of stomachs growling and begging for something more substantial. I stood on top of a ladder, edging the walls with a final coat of paint.

“What do you want to do for dinner?” I asked Adriana.

She smiled and asked, “Strip club pizza?”