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The Happy Hour, yes, of course.

How could I have possibly forgotten the name of the tavern that was pretty much my second home some thirty-odd years ago?

Well, I’ve been forgetting a lot of things lately, so perhaps we shouldn’t ask that question.

The important thing is that I met up this weekend with a bunch of my co-workers from the Pocono Record, where I worked from 1988 to 1992.

We had our grand reunion in the Philadelphia suburb of Swarthmore.

Naturally, I was a nervous wreck in the days leading up to Saturday. I was positive I had gotten my hotel reservation wrong; then convinced I had gotten the date of my bus ticket wrong; and then drop dead certain that I would get lost in Philly and not be able to find the commuter train that would take me out to this lovely college town.

Do I really have to tell you that none of these things happened, and that I can find things to worry about like a truffle hog on a fungi hunt?

No, I didn't think so.

Anyway, I had such a blast meeting up with these people I had not seen in the real world for 30 years.

Social media is fine, and in some cases the only option, but it is absolutely no substitute for that real world connection.

On Saturday Dan, who so kindly organized this event, took us to Eastern State Penitentiary, which housed such notable nogoodniks as Al Capone and Willie Sutton.

The place, which looked like a medieval dungeon, operated under the Pennsylvania system of incarceration, where prisoners were kept in separate cells and forbidden to communicate with fellow inmates.

The idea was that prisoners would have time to reflect on their misdeeds and eventually reform, but many people criticized the system, including Charles Dickens who wrote about the “torture and agony which this dreadful system prolonged for years, inflicts upon the sufferers.”

This isolation brought back memories of the lockdown in the early days of Covid-19 and reminded me of my own tendency to shut myself off from the world.

That night we all had a fabulous dinner at Dan’s house and the old war stories came rolling out, as we recalled the people and places that made our time at the Record so special and so bizarre.

Pushing Deadline

I was miserable at the Record back then and there are many times that I wished I had never heard of the place, but then I would never met these wonderful people.

And then we tried to remember the name of the bar that so many of us went to after work. It was just down the block from the paper…right near the bus station…now what the hell was the name of it?

I had lunch there during my first week on the job with some of the senior reporters. After I got more acclimated to the paper and the town, I would go down to this place for more than a few beers.

I didn’t have to be at work until 2 pm, so I had plenty of time to sober up before show time.

One of the exhibits at Eastern State asks visitors if they ever committed a crime and immediately the words “drunken driving” popped into my mind.

I’m sure there were many nights I drove home through of the streets of Stroudsburg blitzed out of my skull.

It was late, there was nobody around, and I was only a few blocks from home, but I was still driving under the influence. Not a good look for a police reporter.

On Sunday, Susan, another Record veteran (victim?) showed up for breakfast and more memories. But she couldn’t remember the name of the bar either.

After a walk around town, it was time for me to return to New York and I went through the same transportation agita I subjected myself to the day before, only in reverse. And I got home safe and insane.

Then this morning Robin—who had posed the question in the first place—wrote to us all to say the place was called “The Happy Hour.”

Thank God, we go that settled.

The bar was established in 1957, the year of my birth, and new owners took over in 2019. They added an outdoor deck and now offer signature cocktails and gourmet burgers.

It looks completely different from the late night watering hole I remember. Back then the most popular delicacy was a huge jar of pickled eggs that sat in a jar near the cash register just daring someone to take off the lid.

The new place looks very nice and if I'm ever in Stroudsburg again I'll stop by for a cocktail and a gourmet burger.

In the meantime, I'm very grateful for all the happy hours I spent with my friends.