Missing the Third Spaces

Tonight was the last night Twin Spirits Distilling was open, do we went over one last time. We had lovely drinks and delicious tacos and loaded fries from the food truck. And we wished that we had come here more often.

I've always liked Twin Spirits, but their response doing the pandemic, when you could reserve little greenhouses to sit in, was truly awesome. It was places doing things like that at that time that I think truly kept us going. They still have some of them:

Brutus was especially a fan:

Brutus was also a fan of Lakes and Legends taproom, which also closes forever tonight:

I especially appreciated their dog-friendliness, and the wide variety of people you could see there. When we went for one last drink last week, there was a table of older ladies who drank right until their Metro Mobility bus started honking for them, a somewhat droning musician, people playing cards, a long table of younger folks, several people with dogs, and more than one family. It was awesome.

And then there are all the other lost places: Lawless, of course, which I still miss on an almost-daily basis. Its sister Stilheart, which always seems slightly off but which I still appreciated for all the fine folk who worked there. Fabulous Ferns (though that was long ago), the neighborhood command central. Ngon, with its lovely cocktails. Forepaugh's. The Bad Waitress. The Black Dog. Tampon (then Kyatchi). The Red Stag. Wilde Roast. Tin Whiskers. Stacked Deck. Eastlake Brewing. (Soon) Salut.

These are our third spaces, where we gather and recreate and enjoy ourselves. As noted above, in many cases they are the ones who made it through covid trying to serve us, and made innovations in doing so. And now I miss them.

What are the third spaces you work hard to keep open?