Where did everybody go? Long-time restaurants close their doors

In the past couple of months, two -- count 'em two -- restaurants I used to frequent have closed. Two of my favorite breakfast and lunch hangouts. Didn't find out they were "gone" until a friend and I agreed to meet at one on a chilly Sunday earlier in November. Then we met up at the second one, and it, too, had a nearly empty parking lot. By the time we arrived at a third place, it was already crowded with people who also used to go to the other two.

Geez. In the past several months, the Baker's Square that had been in my town for who knows how many years bit the dust. Now, two more in Mt. Prospect. I knew we were in a recession, but... Monica's had logged at least a decade, maybe 15 years. The other recent closing, the Egg Factory, close to, if not ten years. I scoured the online versions of local newspapers for a blurb or two about their demise. Nothing. Don't they even merit a blurb?

Perhaps what saddens me most is that there were terrific conversations at each of those hangouts, milestone moments. With a friend one time, one year, I really needed to whine. (No, I don't just whine once a year. Hardly.) When my older brother was in town during the holidays. Receiving reassurance from an old friend when I said I had finally decided to apply to graduate school. With Mom after a memorial Mass on the anniversary of Dad's death.

The memories remain. But I'm a little wistful, still.