This is 74: Kathy Kirkpatrick—Co-Founder of Legendary 'Life Café'—Responds to The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire

"I grew up female when we were expected to do what we were told. I bucked that, but it wasn’t easy. "

From the time I was 10, I’ve been obsessed with what it means to grow older. I’m curious about what it means to others, of all ages, and so I invite them to take “The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire.”

Here, Kathy Kirkpatrick, proprietor of Life Café, the late East Village hot spot that was immortalized in the late Jonathan Larson’s musical, Rent—and where

Brian Macaluso

had our first date in 2003— responds. -Sari Botton

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Kathy Kirkpatrick in June, 2024.

Kathy Kirkpatrick opened Life Café in the East Village of New York City in 1981 with her first husband David Life, who later founded Jivamukti Yoga. In 1996 the Broadway musical RENT by late Pulitzer Prize winner Jonathan Larson first opened at New York Theatre Workshop featuring Life Café, putting the café on a new trajectory.

She published a memoir by her husband John Sunderland, On My Way to Jorvik, about how he went from an 11-year-old maths truant to changing cultural heritage presentation forever as Project Designer of the first immersive archaeological museum, Jorvik Viking Centre in York, UK, 1984. She and John are putting together his second memoir, The Last Shepherd’s Dog and Other Stories from a Rural Spanish Village High and Hidden in the Costa Blanca Mountains. It depicts their delightful, surreal life as retired expats with their adopted dog that belonged to the last shepherd of the village.

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How old are you?

74.

Is there another age you associate with yourself in your mind? If so, what is it? And why, do you think?

I think back to my 40s when I was at my physical peak lifting weights, running around Tompkins Square Park, and practicing Iyengar Yoga six days a week. Sometimes I’m 7 when I wondered what life was, because WTF just happened, because it shouldn’t have. Other times I’m 12 when I doubted my feelings. There are times when I’m 18, and don’t know what life’s about, but I’m gonna dive in anyway because I gotta get outta here and move on. I think of those ages during times I grapple with existence on this planet.

I escaped my parents’ home at 18 without their consent and moved to be with my boyfriend from college. I had no plans for how I would survive. The guy convinced me to marry him. I began to discover myself, then he dragged me (willingly) on a two-year camping road trip across America, and eventually to New York City, where we opened Life Café.

Do you feel old for your age? Young for your age? Just right? Are you in step with your peers?

I feel mentally resilient (I’m a Sudoku and crossword addict), and I’m told I look young for my age. I have aches, and can’t do what I used to. I envy my peers who painlessly move through gravity.

What do you like about being your age?

Having experience, clarity, and a bit of wisdom. I’m pleased I can offer practical advice to someone who asks for it. I’m more open and willing to open my heart and live more fully in awareness, which is an ongoing process.

Kathy Kirkpatrick, left, in 1981 with her first husband, and Life Cafe co-founder, David Life.

What is difficult about being your age?

Having hip pain so I can no longer walk the mountain paths around our house. Having hands so weak I can’t open a jar of mayonnaise. Having back pain after two hours of cooking, a cherished creative activity. I do it anyway, or at least try.

What is surprising about being your age, or different from what you expected, based on what you were told?

I was practicing yoga before a mirror. I was able to see my face while doing downward facing dog and was amazed to see the skin sag in wrinkly lines. My body was melting before my eyes.

A painting of Life Café, on the corner of Avenue B and 10th Street, made in 1989 by an unknown artist and given to the cafe. For decades the restaurant was a haunt for artists, writers and musicians and others in the East Village. Playwright Jonathan Larson wrote some of Rent there, and then included scenes that take place there in the play.

What has aging given you? Taken away from you?

Aging has given me gratitude to have lived all these years, and experienced all that I did. I’m grateful that I still have some time left, a chance to reconcile things. Aging has given me time, because I’ve had to slow down. Aging has diminished physical and mental resilience.

How has getting older affected your sense of yourself, or your identity?

I sense that I’m one of a larger whole, that we are one, we’re in this together. I don’t feel alone like I used to. I did messed-up things but I’m not bad; only I need to own up to them.

Aging has given me gratitude to have lived all these years, and experienced all that I did. I’m grateful that I still have some time left, a chance to reconcile things. Aging has given me time, because I’ve had to slow down. Aging has diminished physical and mental resilience.

What are some age-related milestones you are looking forward to? Or ones you “missed,” and might try to reach later, off-schedule, according to our culture and its expectations?

I strive to accept, embrace, and forgive—myself especially. It’s my nature to “go with the flow” so I never established milestones. I grew up female when we were expected to do what we were told. I bucked that, but it wasn’t easy.

Kathy Kirkpatrick at the New York Theater Workshop in 1996, when Jonathan Larson’s Rent was first staged there.

What has been your favorite age so far, and why? Would you go back to this age if you could?

All ages were hard. My life before 7 could have been good if I were born into other circumstances. But I was closest to my truest self then. I might go back to 23 or 24; I discovered a passion for food and cooking then, and how it is a connector of people.

My eyebrows are white with hairs that grow erratically, requiring a trim. I never had to do that before. I apply color every morning, otherwise it looks like I don’t have eyebrows.

Is there someone who is older than you, who makes growing older inspiring to you? Who is your aging idol and why?

I have an 82-year-old Dutch friend with deformed arms and hands who has lived in our Spanish village 36 years. She’s a Buddhist who meditates daily, has great clarity of mind, and is fiercely independent. In her youth she was gorgeous, stylish with platinum blond. She studied cultural anthropology at university in Holland, was a painter, and travelled to Kenya, India and Nepal. She lives alone in her house stuffed with stunning Buddhist artifacts and reads avidly, surrounded with stacks of books and magazines written in Dutch, German, and English.

Due to debilitating hip and muscle deterioration, she walks an inch at a time with the aid of a crutch and wall braces. Sometimes she gets angry because “Everything moves so slow.” She has helpers in her home four days a week and prefers being on her own the other days, which scares me lately. She’s never complained about her disability; she has simply adjusted how she moves. I love visiting her, talking, hearing her easy laugh. I bring her tasty treats that she enjoys eating. She’s my teacher of how to grow old well, without resentment and judgment. I hope to be more like her.

Yours truly (Sari Botton), far left, at Life Cafe in 2002 with friends, including Kathy Kirkpatrick, back center. I’m sitting across from an ex. A year later I’d have my first date with my husband there.

What aging-related adjustments have you recently made, style-wise, beauty-wise, health-wise?

My hair turned white in my late 60s. I use a shampoo with açai that gives my hair an amazing purple tone. Everyone says it’s incredible. My eyebrows are white with hairs that grow erratically, requiring a trim. I never had to do that before. I apply color every morning, otherwise it looks like I don’t have eyebrows.

I love Tilda Swinton’s look, but my husband doesn’t like it on me. I trust his opinion. It’s a challenge to find a color that fits my new coloring. Grey tends to go on too dark. My husband is an artist and I’ve seen him mix paints, which has inspired me to try to do that with makeup. I use a grey brow pencil, blend, finish with taupe powder, blend. It’s tricky and requires light as I don’t see as well as I used to. It’s tedious, but if I get it right my husband doesn’t laugh at me. I care less what people think of how I look. Still, it’s important to maintain a sense of dignity and grace.

I sense that I’m one of a larger whole, that we are one, we’re in this together. I don’t feel alone like I used to.

I only wear comfortable clothes. If I can get away with it, I don’t wear a bra. My boobs have gotten bigger than I would ever had dreamed, and I don’t want to cause too much excitement. I developed foot issues after 32 years on my feet at Life Café and can only wear Skechers.

Health-wise, I have a lot more doctor visits. Fortunately, so far so good. I exercise, sleep six to seven hours, eat healthy, keep connected to people, be creative, meditate, and contemplate.

Kathy Kirkpatrick with Iggy Pop at Life Café in 1998.

What’s an aging-related adjustment you refuse to make, and why?

I refuse to act like an angry old person. I use all the energy I can muster to achieve things and actively build awareness, in order to control anger that bubbles up.

I believe everything is meant to happen as it does. Our job in life is to figure out what we were supposed to learn from our experiences. To regret your life is to deny your existence, life itself.

What turn of events had the biggest impact on your life? What took your life in a different direction, for better or worse?

There were three. The day I escaped my parents’ home at 18 without their consent and moved to be with my boyfriend from college. I had no plans for how I would survive. The guy convinced me to marry him. I began to discover myself, then he dragged me (willingly) on a two-year camping road trip across America, and eventually to New York City, where we opened Life Café.

The second one is the day I walked into our apartment after a weekend trip with friends from Jamaica and found my husband had moved out without telling me and moved in with another woman. That explained why he refused to come on the trip. We’d been married 13 years. He left a half-hour long voice message on the answering machine that I couldn’t comprehend. We never talked about it. I crashed. After 42 years, I’m finally making headway getting over the feeling of abandonment and rejection. Of course, that relationship was tied up with childhood trauma issues I’ve had.

Life Cafe in its early days, in the 1980s. Photo via Faithful Journey New York on Facebook.

The third is the day I had to follow my lawyers’ advice to “abandon” Life Café, when I walked out and locked the doors for good. They warned me to avoid answering media queries, of which there were many. That was so difficult. I screamed, sharing Life’s demise with everyone, because they wanted to know. Leaving was the only way to get released from the legal jaws of the landlord who owned one of the buildings.

Serendipitously, at the same time the landlord at our second location, Life 983 in Bushwick, refused to renew my lease and I was forced to give up that business too. I was 62 years old, and very, very tired, so I retired, and within a couple of months moved to Spain.

Playwright Jonathan Larson shortly before the off-Broadway premiere of Rent. He sadly died of an aortic dissection the night before previews began. Life Cafe is immortalized in Rent, as the cafe where the East Village characters hang out.

My British husband has kids in the UK, so now he’d be closer to them. Had I known Spain was in the cards, I would have studied Spanish sooner! As much as I resisted letting Life Café go and the tethers of my life prior to it, it was time to move on. My husband and I still say prayers of gratitude to the landlords.

All these events were the hardest, and for the better. The universe sent me messages (more like kicks to my tenacious butt) to keep moving and learning. Life continues in a positive direction.

Left: Kathy Kirkpatrick and her husband John Sunderland before Life Cafe closed; Center: Kathy with the restaurant’s excellent nachos; Right: together in Spain in 2015.

What is your number one regret in life? If you could do it all over again, what is the biggest thing you’d do differently?

I believe everything is meant to happen as it does. Our job in life is to figure out what we were supposed to learn from our experiences. To regret your life is to deny your existence, life itself. If my circumstances were different, I would have liked to pursue writing. I’ve always loved reading, loved books, dabbled in writing. I love words, and delight in brilliant wordsmithing.

I was 62 years old when I closed Life Café, and very, very tired, so I retired, and within a couple of months moved to Spain. My British husband has kids in the UK, so now he’d be closer to them. Had I known Spain was in the cards, I would have studied Spanish sooner! As much as I resisted letting Life Café go and the tethers of my life prior to it, it was time to move on.

What is high up on your “bucket list?” What do you hope to achieve, attain, or plain enjoy before you die?

I have a memoir. I want it to be written well. I want to publish it and share the story of Life Café, because its Facebook pages get hundreds of views weekly, even after all these years. I want to create a vehicle for people who loved Life Café to share the memories. Before I die, I want to accept and embrace all that happened in my lifetime and to forgive. I want to know contentment.

A scene from the film adaptation of Rent in which the cast has gathered at a fictionalized version of Kathy Kirkpatrick’s storied East Village haunt, Life Cafe [relocated in the film to Vazac’s, aka “Horseshoe Bar”]:

Is there a piece of advice you were given, that you live by? If so, what was it, and who offered it to you?

“Lick your plate clean.” It was passed on to me in my genes from my ancestors from both sides of the family, Lithuanian peasants who were persecuted by the Russian Empire, the Nazis and others. My mother, who lived through the Great Depression, pushed that on me when I was a picky eater as a kid. My mother’s brother wrote about how his parents enforced that on their family. Paradoxically, without knowing that history, I used those same words as a tag line at Life Café, and jokingly praised any customer who left a clean plate. Today I admonish my husband because he always leaves bits on his!

“Lick your plate clean” was passed on to me in my genes from my ancestors from both sides of the family, Lithuanian peasants who were persecuted by the Russian Empire, the Nazis and others. My mother, who lived through the Great Depression, pushed that on me when I was a picky eater as a kid…I used those same words as a tag line at Life Café, and jokingly praised any customer who left a clean plate.

What are your plans for your body when you’re done using it? Burial? Cremation? Body Farm? Other? And what do you expect to happen to your “soul” or “spirit” after you die?

My husband and I arranged to donate our bodies to a medical university in Alicante, Spain. I’m leaning towards the idea of reincarnating again, if I don’t get it all figured out this time round.

Kathleen Kirkpatrick published her husband’s memoir, and will publish another of his books that’s in the works. Now she wants to write her own. Order the book…

What’s your philosophy on celebrating birthdays as an adult? How do you celebrate yours?

I don’t make a big deal. Except to be grateful to have been given all the years before. I believe I’m granted this time to attain resolution, to understand why the heck I’m here.

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