Patreon Blog Takeover: Callahan's Crosstime Stable (Brumby Run) · 4:14pm Jan 19th, 2018
This is one of those cases where I have to paste in the original request.
For my blog request, I’d like to discuss Callahan’s Crosstime Saloon. I know that you’ve said that you would never attempt to write a crossover, because of the difficulty involved. But maybe you could write about The Place?
First up, would Equestria even need something like The Place? We have seen some broken ponies in your world, but does the herd manage to care for them better? Does a version of Callahan’s exist in Equestria, or is it simply not needed?
The ponies most in need of the Callahan magic appear to be the princesses. (Is Cadance the most well adjusted of the four?) I do often wonder what their respective toasts would be. And their drink of choice (I bet Cadance goes for the Irish coffee).
Now, for most of the people here, Brumby is speaking in tongues. It's been decades since the Place debuted in fiction, and we're fifteen years beyond the publication date of the most recent novel. We're at that point in its life where you know about it from having stumbled in, or if someone who cared gave you the directions. It's nowhere near as known as it once was, and even those who seek may look at the dust on the counter and sadly shake their heads.
So before I can answer his question, I have to answer yours. I have to tell you what he's talking about, and why it was important once. Why those of us who read the yellowed pages too long after the events pretend we were there for the best of it. Also because the actual answers are going to be pretty #@$ short, and so I'm padding out the runtime.
Oh, and for what it's worth... minor spoilers ahead.
Callahan's Place was an American bar. Watering hole. A semi-modern Irish pub which managed to talk itself into allowing female clientele earlier than some. It was located in the state of New York, on Long Island, somewhere along Route 25A. To the best anyone can work out, it was within shouting distance of Smithtown. It featured live piano music, the best Irish coffee on the island, and could go through several hundred glass mugs and shot glasses per night. They got broken a lot. They were meant to be broken, and no one ever really asked how the proprietor managed to get them that cheaply in bulk. No one asked a lot of things until it was too late to ask anything at all.
It hosted riddle games and pun contests. A number of writers frequented it. You got police officers and musicians and physicians and security guards, and I hear they had a vampire once. Callahan's was the kind of bar where on any given night, a vampire might just walk in. (However, in this case, the vampire actually lived within strolling distance, so it was a pretty casual walk.)
Every bar, if it lasts long enough, builds up a core of regulars. The Place was set up back in the 1950s, died by mini-nuke just as the 80s were settling in. (There's a story in that. There would almost have to be, don't you think?) Enough time to gather a crew. People who just wandered in because that was where they had to be. More often, the ones who arrived because someone who loved them passed over the directions, generally to keep them from dying.
It also builds up traditions. One of the most frequent: if someone told a truly horrible joke, you didn't applaud or groan. (For the world-class abomination, you held your nose and ran screaming into the night.) You tossed your glass into the fireplace, which had been built as a parabolic reflector to channel all the shards inside. The Place went through a lot of glasses, and that was built into the price of the drinks. Return your mug intact, take some money out of the till. (The till was open to the public. It was that kind of bar.)
But there was also the tradition of the toast. Anyone who came in, purchased a drink... they could stand in front of that fireplace, and speak their toast before slinging the glass into the heat. And if it was an interesting sort of toast, the bar would stop. They would listen. (They would never pry: prying got you a blackjack upside your skull from the piano player, who'd snuck up behind you while you weren't looking.) And then, if they could, they would try to help. They usually succeeded, and their biggest failure didn't want to change enough to be helped.
They had an alien come in, and that's why the world didn't end on the night he arrived. There was a time traveler who did it the hard way, and a few who got more creative about it. Two telepaths dropped by once. The vampire? That was one of the regulars, as was the talking dog. But the core of it, the true heart, was a scraggly-haired folk musician who had a wife and child until the day he decided to fix his own brakes, and after that he just about had a suicide. Then he had a talk with a friend, a drive, and eventually, he had some healing.
It was run by a big Irishman named Michael Callahan. It had a Free Lunch and a good place to watch the sky from the roof. The parking lot was a crazy-quilt mess, the puns were horrible, and the barflies saved the world a few times, seldom while fully sober.
"Just as there are Laws of Conservation of Matter and Energy, so there are in fact Laws of Conservation of Pain and Joy. Neither can ever be created or destroyed. But one can be converted into the other."
It was that kind of bar.
Callahan's Place was a series of short stories written by Spider Robinson, along with a few follow-up novels. As it's been around for decades, it has also been a Usenet group, a point-and-click adventure game, a couple of Facebook pages, a GURPS RPG setting, and a philosophy: that pain shared is pain lessened, and thus we move forward. It is, for the modern brony or pegasister, slightly ironic in that Mike's hometown is a place called Harmony. It's a product of its time, as well as a frozen snapshot of the era.
It has left its stamp on the Continuum. It's the reason there's a crack in the library door, and why the bank has a rather unsuitable employee named Stonebender.
The books? I would recommend the original short stories, which are now bound into collections. It's easy to find them all in one place. You can decide for yourself whether you want to investigate the novels: personally, I feel they weaken as they move up the line. But the adults in the audience probably won't regret meeting Mike's spouse, who runs her own business in Brooklyn. (Warning: it's a brothel. But it's a really good one.)
But even without that, maybe you know enough now for me to answer Brumby's questions. Just a little.
Does a version of the Place exist in Equestria? It would be nice to think that many of them do. If you interpret a bartender's mark as being for nothing more than mixing, wiping down the counter, and making sure the till balances after closing, then it's a little harder to hope. But if you include what so many wish to believe is part of that talent, a skill for listening...
All it takes to build a Place is a core of regulars who care and an owner who's willing to put up with a little madness if it means getting the job done. In that sense, it's slightly easier to imagine such bars being present in Equestria. They're not going to be everywhere: even in a world where harmony has a little more sway, getting the right combination of talents and empathy in one room isn't going to be easy. But there certainly could be a Place in Equestria. It is, much like the original bar, there for those who need it most. Search long enough and you just might find yourself wandering through the doorway, even if you personally had to build the frame.
It would be needed, though. The herd can care for many of its own -- but there are ponies who slip through the cracks, or try to hide within them because they've convinced themselves that they're not only beyond help, but that nopony should waste their time in trying. There are always those who need a Place to be, unless you're so lucky as to be in a world where no one's angry.
Maybe that's what Berry Punch does, if you want to see her that way. Maybe she operates a Place of her own.
What do you want to happen?
As for toasts? Three of the 'verse Princesses might make them. (Twilight doesn't quite have the words yet.) When it comes to drinks, Cadance would take Irish coffee if Ireland only existed. Luna tends towards moonshine, while Celestia will risk a brandy now and again. But toasts...
"To absent friends."
"To self-acceptance."
And I guess those two might be obvious. But it would stop there. The toasts could be made -- but there would be no stories told. Not among strangers, not even with empathy washing over them and minds willing to listen without undue judgment. They share their pain only with each other, and so it seldom lessens for long. At best, there are ebb tides. Nothing more.
But with Cadance...
Is she the best-adjusted? Or have we just not reached the point where the pain begins to truly show itself?
In Triptych itself, Twilight has finally asked Cadance the question via scroll: how did you change? That answer has yet to arrive.
I can promise that some form of reply will appear before the story ends. But it won't be a complete one. She won't break down her 'process' step by step, moment by moment. She can't. Because for Cadance, that is where the agony waits. She tries not to think about her change: she refuses to look back any more than she has to, and thus only does so every day.
And because this is a short blog, a brief answer only, perhaps not quite fair value... I'm providing one extra thing, and it starts as being for Brumby alone. I am going to give him, in PM, behind a spoiler curtain -- one he alone can decide whether to part -- something Cadance will say in the near future. He can decide whether to share the words.
They won't provide answers. They may only bring more questions, while suggesting a story yet to be told. But they are the core of the Cadance which exists only here.
But for everyone else... I can at least give you her toast.
"To survival."
And there the words would stop.
I got literal chills at the end. I've heard of the Place before, though I've never had firsthand experience with it. Clearly something I should rectify.
As for the toasts... Brumby, if you're reading this and you do decide to share with the rest of us, please add a reply to this comment when you do. This opened a whole lot of questions I hadn't thought to ask.
And here's hoping that the sisters will take advantage of the sympathetic ears who are learning more than either realizes.
Seriously great reading here. I'm going to check that series out first chance I get.
It's been 30+ years since I last read any of the stories, but IIRC some of the features of the bar.
One night a week was punday night. Someone would start a subject & every round the next one had to either follow with a pun comment on the subject or pay the tab & drop out. Last fool standing got his tab comped for the night (Usually Doc Webber)
The talking dog was a ventriloquist & AFAIK the inspiration for Gaspar (?) (the talking dog in some of the Discworld novels)
Hitler walked in one night. Far from the weirdest guest that they ever had.
Besides several time travelers from (alternate?) futures, they had at least one from a mirror dimension, + a LOT of aliens including a couple who had a mission to conquer/destroy the world. One of the first was named Michael Finn & he became the bouncer
There was a box on the bar to pay for your drinks. You put in double what a drink usually cost. If you wanted to , you could make a toast & throw your glass into the fireplace. (or if someone else made a toast). If not, you took your change from the box. (The cost was supposedly more than the glass cost). The front door was patched from where The Only Fool To EVER Try & Cheat On This was ejected from the bar (ICR the exact name "Big Beef" Something Irish)
Because of this custom, they didn't sell pitchers, only by the drink (it's more expensive that way)
I could see Lyra being the guitar player (well, lyre player in her case, of course)
Well, the parking should be at least easier...
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Big Beef McCaffrey. He tried to shake Mike down for protection money and Mike responded by issuing him an 'invitation to the world': threw him out of the Place without bothering to open the door first. This put a crack in said door, which was left there as a gentle reminder to other criminals: the Place is off-limits.
Mickey didn't become the full-time bouncer. He would keep the peace on the nights he was there, but he spent most of his time traveling up until he got married.
The cigar box is as you remember it. The costs did go up over time: when the Place closed, it was around three dollars per drink, or two if you returned the mug. Early on, change was made in quarters.
The punday contest rules also applied to Tall Tale Night (which typically ended in puns so bad as to make throwing the book mandatory. As this reaction sets in several times per collection, I recommend reading physical copies. Tablet repair costs add up fast). And yes, Doc Webster took most of the wins. It was a sign of confidence to drink a lot on a contest night. It also, for most people who weren't Doc Webster, put a dent in your skills. However, the Doc was significantly overweight and soaked up alcohol like a sponge, so...
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As Jake described it, the situation was so bad that several times per night, most of the bar would have to go outside to back-and-fill in series in order to let someone go home. While the Place itself was of decent size, the parking lot appears to have been pitifully underpowered. And you really can't park on the sides of 25A or rather, you can't do it for long.
In a pony version, you'd just have to worry about customers who were hauling things home. Somewhat less of a tangle. Of course, if ponies are drunk enough, just trotting out of the bar might mean asking customers to back-and-fill themselves.
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I thought I remembered it as a cigar box, but then I said to myself "No, that wouldn't be big enough", Guess it got emptied several times a night.
Several attempts to rob the place, none successful. One would be robber wound up as an assistant bartender. I could see Pinkie as the pony equivalent of Cheerful Charley, or as one who needed cheering up.
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Jake had a theory that Mike just liked to wait until the bar had closed before rubbing his face with all of the one-dollar bills.
For those trying to follow this: the Cheerful Charlies were a married couple (Les Glueham & Merry Moore) whose declared (and paying) profession was bringing people back from depression. They had a variety of tactics for achieving their goal, a few of which were illegal. (In the Last Resort Only category was sleeping with a client: something they placed as 'when all else fails' in order to keep the human mind from rationalizing itself into going under the blankets. The Place's crew also wasn't above smoking the occasional joint, although it wasn't for everyone.) Bringing a client to Callahan's was on the more typical option list -- but the Place, while it helped many, didn't work for everyone. And due to the nature of their profession, every so often, no matter what they tried, they would lose one to suicide: it would take the entire group to put them back together again.
I remember all the stories, and I think a lot of people in Fandom in that era would have wanted a place like that, somewhere.
We wanted that place where all of us misfits could be accepted, and (this is very important) safe, as quite a few of our contemporaries needed that safety and the knowledge that the monsters would never come in, ever. I think this is where a lot of the people that got started in sci-fi/fantasy/anime fandom started from at my age-we wanted the place where we would be accepted, and where we would be allowed to be ourselves, whatever that was.
(Insert LOOOONG rant about fandom and the...people...that have taken over.)
(Insert second LOOOOOOOOOOONG rant about how fandom allowed quite a few predators in their midst, because they were "the right people.)
I even knew of a BDSM playspace in the SF Bay Area that tried to be run like Lady Sally's and...still there, still doing okay, but the last I heard of it and the people there, the only difference between that place and Game of Thrones is fewer deaths and dragons.
Closest place I can think of in Ankh-Morpock would be Biers?
Typical laywers, they stole the Bar, then charge blood to even enquire of it.
Several members of the family have worked the bar, at least one branch ran The Mariners Arms right next to Keadby Docks for a couple generations. Now theres a real blending pot and mix in, just not in the middle of the City like Long Island or Manchester.
But thats the main rule about The Bar. You may Talk, but may never Tell.
Do so, and you can lose The Bar.
Forever.
Maybe Equestrias bar has a corridoor out back leading to side rooms, back rooms, bedrooms, and The Hall.
I'm going to place one of the tall tales here, under Fair Use. If you're going in, then you'd better know just what you're in for.
All of the writing within the quote box below was done by Spider Robinson. Callahan's stories are told in first-person, so when you see "I", it's Jake Stonebender speaking.
My encountering Callahan's Lady sometime around the age of 20 was massively formative in several ways and is the single biggest inspiration behind Ember's.
I should re-read it now that the contents won't be shocking, strange and revelatory, and see what I think of it.
Love Callahan's! But then I've always had a weakness for the Magical Bar genre. The Place, the White Hart, Cantina de los Coyotes, the one Poul Anderson wrote about, and I can't remember the name... and all those...
I think that such a place with a true Equestrian feel wouldn't be a bar, though. It'd be more like the Cakes bakery... or better yet Pony Joe's after dark... fun to think about.
Estee,
I was quite moved by the love shown here for Spider's world. It is a very important set of tales for me (though in some ways, Very Hard Choices and Very Bad Deaths are more so, but that's another story) and I happen to have an acquaintance with Spider as well.
Your summary is spot on, and I think your quotes are perfect. I'd love to see or collaborate on a pony story based on The Place. I saw one about a cafe that exists outside time and space that had a somewhat similar feel, but darned if I can recall it's title or author right now.
Anyway, as a long-time lover of these stories I had to drop by with a comment. Thanks for posting about this - it really added to my happiness today.
May we all find and foster better empathy and compassion for ourselves and each other.
Light and laughter,
SongCoyote
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I’m going to disappoint people here by not revealing the contents of the PM. It will be revealed in Triptych soon enough, and I wouldn’t want to lessen the impact it will have. Thank you for the sneak peak, Estee. But I hope you are aware that you have raised in me more questions.
I could see Celestial and Luna figuring out the tradition of the toast, without understanding its true significance. Damnit, I can almost feel future echoes of the bruise the blackjack is going to leave... The worst part is, the rule about nosey questions would have them running away from the Place, rather than getting over their self imposed emotional exile.
Thank you for the blog.
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Not Sugarcube Corner. More of a standard bakery Maybe Pony Joe's. (That's the place the Mane 6 went after the Gala in Best Night Ever (S1 E26)) & IMO looks more like a coffee shop.
Estee already touched on the Mane 6 behavior in bars in one of the chapters in Triptych. Rarity probably spends the most time in bars & is the lightweight of the group.
AJ https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=lyrics+10+rounds+with+jose+cuervo&&view=detail&mid=A4C528069BA87310A24AA4C528069BA87310A24A&&FORM=VDRVRV
Pinkie https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=lyrics+jose+cuervo&&view=detail&mid=475AE80678648643298D475AE80678648643298D&&FORM=VDRVRV
Rarity (from being hit on)https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=that+don%27t+impress+me+much+pmv&&view=detail&mid=3D4C8634B6FE74AF49453D4C8634B6FE74AF4945&&FORM=VDRVRV
if you like online comics, you might try the cross-time cafe:
http://www.whiteponyproductions.com/
side-note: i have several of the Callahan's place books. a few of the stories the stories they tell are quite sad...
i think my favorite book is "Callahan's key", wherein all the regulars move to Key West, in the Florida Keys, and set up "The Place". then they have to save the world again.
It's rather odd that I disliked Spider Robinson's writing, except Callahan's Lady and - later - Callahan's Cross-time Salon. For some reason Callahan and Lady Sally just struck a chord with me.
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Strangely, I've really only enjoyed one other book from him: Telempath -- and I feel it falls apart towards the end.
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You are thinking of the excellent
- MLP: FiM
- Comedy
- Mystery
- Slice of Life
There's a cafe at the edge of town: cozy, warm, and inviting. A place to go when you need somewhere to be. But here, in this cafe, everyone is equal. In this cafe, everyone is free to speak their mind. And in this cafe, the Gods listen back.4777727
You are quite correct on both counts! Thanks for the reminder; that one is worth perusing again.
Light and laughter,
SongCoyote
Callahan's
Now that's a name I've not heard in a long time...
syfy.com/sites/syfy/files/styles/syfy_wire_nav_pulldown_teaser/public/wire/legacy/images/luke-skywalker-new-hope_0.jpg?itok=V5-mT0zs
...A long time.
img.cinemablend.com/filter:scale/quill/e/5/4/8/6/0/e548603730d9b632f38a390b8fb6d173798618db.jpg?mw=600
Callahan's.... I remember those story in the yellowed pages of the paperbacks. Part of my growing up and reading science fiction/fantasy phase that I still love and remember. There was a lot to those stories not just of the hard sciences, but of the softer sciences that I loved too. Pony's having a Callahan's Bar- that makes a lot of sense. How else can you find and share friendship. I eagerly await with baited breathe stories based on this concept!
Twenty, thirty years ago, I loved this series. But now, thinking about it makes me very angry, and puts me in mind of another Spider Robinson quote: "If you're bad, you go to hell. But if you're utterly, irredeemably evil, they give you a tour of heaven first." Spider Robinson created a miracle place, one that couldn't possibly exist, one that needed time-traveling sci-fi shenanigans to function, and then, by the end of the series, put the onus on us to create such a place.
"This? This is my beautiful luxury mansion. Don't have one? Well, you've no-one to blame but yourself. Best get on that, then."
I dunno. Maybe it was my state of mind at the time, but I could only read about such a glorious place so much before I felt that he was rubbing my face in it, this thing that I would never have and never could.
Bah. I'll go be old and grumpy somewhere else. But before I go,
These people never end up in Callahan's. I nearly cried when I read that description, for I've known them, and been them, and they would walk through the door, feel the love, decide that such wasn't for such as them, and leave.
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Telempath, like Mindkiller, started life as a short story/novella and, as you say, it shows. Though I personally enjoyed them both, nothing Mr. Robinson has written ever topped Callahan's.
I back in the mid to late 90s the X-men/comic book fandom had a thing called the Subreality Cafe. Sounds like this might have been what inspired it
Sticking my 2 cents in.
IMO, EQ bars probably sell as much or more cider as beer (at least, small Earth Pony farm towns do). I'd doubt they have Irish Coffee (& certainly not under that name). They might well have Hot Mulled Cider. Various recipes.
All involve brown sugar or molasses (both made from sugarcane), citrus fruit (or at least the peel), cinnamon, cloves, allspice, (whatever that is, says the bachelor) + apple juice or cider, of course
+ cooking long enough & hot enough that any alcohol is gone, thus creating a foal friendly drink. Some recipes add rum (or, in EQ maybe applejack) to create an adult beverage.
Made at home, you serve when ready. In a bar, you've got the problem of keeping it warm without overcooking it. I'd keep it warm, then heat it up just before serving. Unicorns probably zap it, but the old Earth Pony way might be to keep red hot pokers in a roaring fire & stick one in the mug at the last instant (Seen it done that way -once. Also only time I've ever had this)
An alternative is to only serve it a few times a night, say an hour or so before midnight . (Too busy during Happy Hour?) Maybe even only on special nights, like Hearth's Warming. This is a Traditional Earth Pony Custom. Most Traditional Foods come in 2 groups
1) The newbie is advised to start with something easier & work up. (Raw sewage, perhaps.) (Ever had Retsina? Tastes like someone took cheap ass red wine & added turpentine)
2) Good, but it takes a freaking TON of work & hardly anyone bothers anymore.
As it is a Traditional Earth Pony Drink, there isn't a Unicorn bartender in Canterlot that wouldn't die under torture before admitting they've ever even heard of it. You want it, you go to a back country bar like Ponyville? Maybe Princess Luna misses it? IRL, suicide rate goes up around holidays. Maybe in EQ, too.
Oh, and from experience, the more highly spiced a drink is, the stronger it tastes even with barely a drop of alcohol in it.
Cadence questions now that the next chapter of Triptych came out-
How many digits were the casualties when she became an Alicorn?
Does Cadence think of herself as weak for fear of what would happen if she was strong?
And, is what happened to Cadence the biggest reason why Celestia was so vehement that Twilight Sparkle wasn't going to learn mark-swapping magic?
One more thing.
It occurs to me that a holiday celebrating the founding of EQ might be very much a PONY thing. Other species ...not so much. With any pony that has any family at all at home celebrating it with their family ...
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=snl+christmastime+for+the+jews&&view=detail&mid=9850FF7E34756C46C1389850FF7E34756C46C138&&FORM=VRDGAR
You might see a LOT more cows, sheep, goats, etc. (? Are goats sentient in your universe? Iron Will uses them as assistants, but ICR that they ever spoke)
IMO, any pony out that night either doesn't have foals or REALLY needs a drink