Sand Through the Hourglass

After a late night grocery store run, I'm sitting at a corner table in the back of the 12South Tap Room, having a quick beer before I head home.  Once upon a time, the Tap Room was one of my regular haunts, before the 12South building and population explosion.

In fact, between six and seven years ago, when J.P. was in infant, he and strolled to the Tap Room almost every Saturday afternoon while he napped in the City Elite.  More often than not, he and I were the only people in the bar on those lazy Saturday afternoons.  While he slept, I read the New Yorker, worked crossword puzzles or just relaxed.

For a while, I arranged for special guests to meet us at the Tap Room on Saturday afternoons.  Among those who made cameo appearances were Mike Matteson, Rip Pewett and Peter Klett (w/his son, Cortland).  It was the beginning of my fatherhood ride and for the most part, a blissful time in my life.  With two boys and with J.P. starting school, playing sports, etc., things are more hectic now, for sure.

I miss the early days.

When J.P. and I first started dropping by the Tap Room on Saturday afternoons, I got to know a bartender named "Sweeney."  As we chatted amiably one day, I realized I had played softball against him in the law league a few years earlier.  He had hit 2 or 3 home runs off me and I hadn't seen him since that game.  It turned out his father is a lawyer I know and we had a few laughs about him coming out of nowhere (seemingly) to hammer the (self-proclaimed) best softball pitcher in the history of the law league.

Over the next few years, I saw Sweeney less and less as I stopped coming into the Tap Room as often.  I lost track of him, for the most part, until tonight, when he happened to be working.  He told me he's down to his last two weeks working at the bar, as he's leaving to work as an "outfitter" (whatever that means) in New Hampshire.  I  remember talking with him after he got married and bought his first house, but perhaps that didn't work out.

Great guy, great personality and a bit player in Act I of my life as a father.

Good luck, Sweeney.