Hooked on hard drugs, Greg Ekbom overdosed more than once, eventually landing in a hospital in a coma-like state.

“When I woke up, I didn’t really know where I was,” said Ekbom, recalling the terrifying but fateful day 50 years ago that sent him on the rocky path to longtime sobriety.

It started with a methadone program, which was miserable.

“That was the bottom. That was the worst,” recalled Ekbom, who had dropped out of a cooking program at a remedial skills center in Minneapolis at the time. “The government was giving me drugs. You got in trouble if you didn’t show up and do your drugs everyday. It was basically to keep you from committing crimes.”

Greg Ekbom, center, retired owner of the Day by Day Café, with his son John Ekbom, right and daughter Gena Ekbom, who now own the St. Paul restaurant on Friday, Nov. 24, 2023. Ekbom started the cafe as while still in recovery and created a safe and welcoming place for those in recovery. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)

With the help of county social services, Ekbom moved into the storied Hazelden Addiction Treatment Center, but even their counselors couldn’t reach him.

“I wasn’t quite ready. I was kind of a screw-off at Hazelden,” he said. After 10 days, he received a referral to an outpatient treatment center on St. Paul’s West Seventh Street, which after a year hired Ekbom and some other enrollees to prepare the center’s lunches out of a kitchen adjoining a nearby sandwich shop.

A lifeline

A seed was planted. And 48 years ago, in the landmark old dining car on West Seventh Street at Superior Street, an early version of Ekbom’s celebrated Day by Day Cafe was born, its name inspired by a tenet of the recovering-community’s liturgy.

In 1980, five years after its opening, the cafe moved into a nearby brick building at West Seventh and Goodrich Street that Ekbom bought out of foreclosure, and it soon grew into a lifeline for former addicts in recovery, who have comprised between 30% and 70% of its staff and any number of its customers on any given year. It’s also been a lifeline for Ekbom, who still attends regular addiction recovery meetings even 50 years into his journey into sobriety. He still describes himself as actively “in recovery,” present tense.

“There are people who say ‘recovered.’ But I don’t,” Ekbom said. “There are people who have long-term sobriety who fall back.”

Whenever he was short on workers, Ekbom used to call a recovery halfway house associated with Hazelden, or get referrals from employees who were already living there. At one point, an influx of artsy, sometimes well-heeled New Yorkers to Hazelden — think musicians and actors — resulted in some interesting additions.

“People called it ‘Minne-sober,’” recalled Ekbom. “They don’t want to go back home right after treatment, which is usually 30 days. They were pretty gifted people. … At one time, I had two psychiatrists applying for a dishwashing job at the same time. One was the head of some psychiatric hospital or school, and he said ‘I’d appreciate it if you didn’t call my previous employer.’ Of course I wouldn’t call them.”

Life after addiction

Being surrounded by so many former addicts — including some who relapsed — only strengthened his commitment to the restaurant, which served as active proof to doubters of life after addiction.

“For me, I think I might not have stayed sober,” Ekbom said. “Working with fellow recovering people I’ve often felt was a benefit to my own recovery. There’s hope, for sure. Some 50 years ago, we didn’t have fentanyl then, but there was all kinds of heroin problems. Back then, it was kind of like ‘once a heroin addict, always a heroin addict.’ That wasn’t really true, but it was some people’s thinking. Fentanyl has only made it worse. I know a lot of recovering heroin addicts. And I know a lot who died.”

Ekbom officially retired almost a decade ago and moved to Osceola, Wis., but he still comes in on occasion to help his two adult children with the restaurant, which stays open from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., seven days per week, year-round except for Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day. Its buckwheat pancakes and homemade granola remain popular draws.

“Everything’s made from scratch — sausage gravy, salsa, our soups and chilis,” said Ekbom’s daughter Gena Ekbom, who has been managing the restaurant with her younger brother John since 2006. “We don’t do any boxed foods.”

“I grew up with the restaurant,” said Gena. “When I was in high school, if I got in trouble, I would have to wash dishes on the weekend.”

These days, her twin son and daughter each work the restaurant with her, each one taking a different day of the weekend.

Greg Ekbom, center, retired owner of Day by Day Café in St. Paul, thanks customers on Friday, Nov. 24, 2023. Ekbom started the cafe as while still in recovery and created a safe and welcoming place for those in recovery. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)

When the pandemic hit in early 2020, the restaurant hit tough times, a familiar place for many of the Day by Day Cafe’s employees and regulars. Ekbom found himself flunking out of retirement and jumping back in to lend a hand.

“For three years, we lost a substantial amount of money,” said Ekbom on Wednesday. “I think this year we’re back to where things were pre-COVID.”

Gratitude for those who helped him on his journey

On Monday, friends and family will toast Ekbom’s 50 years of sobriety and the Day by Day Cafe’s 48 years in operation. As toasts go, it will be lacking in champagne or wine. Instead, Ekbom hopes to serve up generous helpings of hope.

“He’s just like an easy-going guy,” Gena said. “He’s not looking for anything or expecting anything. But to me, if he didn’t stay sober, I wouldn’t be here and the restaurant wouldn’t be here. His sobriety birthday is more important than a regular birthday. He still goes to meetings and is still very active in helping people, and always has great advice for those who need help.”

In a season of giving thanks, Ekbom is feeling plenty of gratitude for those who have helped him on his journey, and the restaurant that serves as good a metaphor as any for his steps along that journey.

“When I bought that building it was condemned,” Ekbom recalled. “It was one of the worst buildings on one of the worst blocks back in ’79. And now it’s a great building on a good block.”

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