Popination Jubilation
a series of unhinged personal essays disguised as pub reviews. Today: Cap City Tavern
Epistle? Apostle? Let’s call the whole thing off.
At church this past Sunday, there was much talk about joy. Weirdly enough, the sermon centered on Paul. Father Lawson said that if he had an opportunity to have a cup of coffee or a pint with anyone from the New Testament, it would NOT be Paul.* But he reminded us that his letters from prison are called the Epistles of Joy. And so a musing ensued, of how one can still feel love and spread joy, when one is in chains. Actually kind of a profound thing to be thinking about amid the world these days. And I happen to like Paul’s crotchetiness—I feel like that’s part of why he was able to get so much done.
*He said it would actually be Mary Magdalen, which I’m very curious about, but that’s another sermon, I guess.
If you know anything about Episcopalians, you know that we’re known to be Catholic Lite (™), which means that we have the chasubles and the choir and organ music and the procession and the swinging incense and the silver-bound gospels and the stained glass and the sitting and standing and kneeling at the right time. And we have things we answer to the words being spoken up there ‘onstage’ (I do still think of it as ‘onstage, so call me a heathen). We have to shake people’s hands around us when it’s Peace time, and of course there’s the Eucharist. We speak the Lord’s Prayer together and we do a group Confession too, aloud together. It’s all written down in cues in the Sunday leaflet, but if you’ve been even a couple times, you get used to when you need to sit or stand, or repeat or fumble for the hymnal, or any of it. It’s all done together. And also with you.
I remember at the first in-person service they held after lockdown loosened: I had joined St. John’s during lockdown and so I had gotten used to all the livestreamed versions of the rituals, as I hadn’t been to church since I was a kid and Mom dragged us to church on Easter. The moment the entire (albeit still relatively small) congregation all spoke a prayer aloud, my breath caught and I almost choked up a little. Having the voices of that whole group of people speaking sonorously, measuring breaths together so that the words would happen at the same time, was a bit overwhelming after months of whispering together with only my partner.
But church STILL isn’t a pub!
I know it isn’t! But it does sit in a particularly crunchy part of Denver, and so there are many pubs and bars of all kinds within a short distance of it. As many of these pubs are also restaurants and thereby open at 11 or 12, I like to get a Popination in to eat lunch and have yet another post-church pub to write about and share with all of you. Today, it was a pub very close to Pints Pub from a couple weeks ago. This was a place I hadn’t heard of before, called Cap CIty Tavern. I didn’t know what to expect, other than that they purportedly serve lots of good American pub grub, like wings and fries and burgers and such. I thought a quick pleasant lunch in a bar would be a nice side quest to my Sunday. Boy was I surprised!
Cap City Tavern
…was packed to the walls as I walked in, after (oddly) getting carded at the door, and stamped on my right hand with a wee smiley face that matched my sleeve tattoo. It only being not quite noon, that was not something I expected. Once I entered the pub, I understood why. There was a festive tribal atmosphere among the packed patrons, standing-room only, that was fueled by two things: Xmas decor, and the Vikings. The football team, not the Norse marauders of old. So hey—it’s a Vikings bar! Who knew? (Apparently all these people crammed to the gills here, that’s who.)
I thought that maybe I should turn around and go somewhere else, if only because there was no place to sit and so I couldn’t easily eat any lunch there. But I decided to order a Dale’s Pale Ale and stick around instead, I’m not sure why. I think I was catching something of the joy in the atmosphere. I’m so glad I did: even though I don’t care whatsoever about football, it turned out to be a great vibe. I stood against an old wood doorframe, tried my best to avoid getting in the servers’ bustling way, and soaked (and sipped) it all in.
I crowded my way up to the beautiful old bar to order my beer, deliver my card, and retreat into a corner where I could hopefully stand without blocking anyone’s view of the game. And they were all there for the game. I sipped my beer and glanced around at the whole place: though the bar is central, there’s three different restaurant alcoves, one of which was a heated back porch. High tables around the bar, and regular low ones all through the rest of the place. I couldn’t see what the blue-sparkly-tinsel-topped back patio was like, but I could see that it was crowded. No seat was open, and most good standable corners were full too.
Above, a bunch of Elves on the Shelves in various complex yoga poses (or were they being tortured? I won’t ask, nor will I judge). Below, remnants of ugly Christmas sweaters covered the bar seat backs, and snowflakes papered the floor. And everyone, every single person there, looked at ease, smiling, eating and drinking, chatting low, and following the football’s flow.
It’s beginning to look a lot like…football
Certainly joy was in the air at Cap City Tavern. Both Christmassy joy and football fan joy. Festivity twofold. I think that’s why I was drawn to stay there for two pints’ worth of time, for football I don’t follow (and not even the Denver Broncos at that). I thought about my old friend Happy, whom I’d met through my time with the Band of Young Men, my swordmates. Happy hailed from Minnesota and so was a big Vikings fan. He was nicknamed that (his name is actually Craig), in small part because Happy Gilmore was popular among us bros at the time, but mainly because he just, was. To quote the leader of the BoYM: ‘You could literally, like, punch him in the face, and he’d just grin and shake his head and go, “Man, that sucks bro.”’
Bu these fans were serious about their joy, and serious about the game too. In fact, there was a fratty looking guy presiding at the corner of the bar, who, every so often (no doubt during a key play or other sort of important game thing I wouldn’t recognize) would raise his phone or his fist, and count everyone in, leading the whole bar patronage in cheers that were precision chants. Sometimes, a crescendo of smacking palms on the bar and tables would culminate in a loud hoorah. I didn’t recognize what in the gameplay spurred such coordinated cheerleading, but it was easy to get caught up in the energy. It reminded me of my one and only football game experience in college. A live game, I mean.
My undergrad alma mater, CU-Boulder, is still very well known for its football, and it was super famous for it back then. I was invited to take over a ticket in the senior section on day, at a game that was against our rivals. Not that I cared whatsoever, but I figured before I graduated, I should maybe have the ol’ college football experience. Plus, there were 3-for-1 drinks at K’s China beforehand, which we consumed on their rooftop bar. The stadium-wide rituals and chants were regular and specific there, too, but especially in the senior section. Every key play, we were supposed to take out our own keys and jangle them over our heads. A star player at the time was named Rashan Salaam, and each time he did something great, we’d all make a sweeping arm gesture and chant his name: ‘Sa-laaaaaaam!’
That sort of thing was happening at Cap City, too. Though I don’t remember the name they were chanting at the bar. Maybe if I’d know it and joined in, it would stick in my brain the way Salaam has.
What’s the difference between the joyous church rituals I had just undergone, and this Vikings bar’s chanting and table smacking? Nothing, that’s what.
The two communal rites are parallel, if not identical. They’re about community, communion. They include watching a staged rite with prescribed sections to it. There are names and chants to deliver together, and of course, the Keeping of the Peace happens in each (especially when there’s a touchdown).
What’s your Eucharist: wine and bread, or wings and beer? I like both. I honor both.
I did both last Sunday, since I’m serious about my joy.