Finding community at your local watering hole

Sometimes you wanna go where everybody knows your name, and they’re always glad you came. But is a “Cheers” fantasy even possible in the post-pandemic age? Jamie Black seems to think so, given that she turned her status as a bar regular at the Overlook Lodge into a job. “I had recently moved out on my own after a relationship ended, and a lot of my friends had moved out of Cincinnati. I asked one of my friends, ‘Well, how do you make friends as an adult? It’s kind of hard.’ So I just started hanging out at Overlook because that was close to me, and made friends with the bartenders,” she said. “At the end of the night, I’d help them put the chairs up, help them wipe down the bar. Not everyone has to do that, but then when I was looking for some extra money outside of my nine to five, I picked up shifts there.” Now a full-time service industry professional, she recognizes the power a bar can hold as a community hub or a third space. “It’s hard to find places where you c