When: Easter Sunday, 4:03pm

I walked the longer walk than anticipated from McCarren Park, down Metropolitan Ave., to Interboro, this brewery/distillery past the Grand St. stop along one of the last remaining gritty strips in Williamsburg. Fittingly, for my last few weeks in NYC, I saw the bank near Graham Ave. that was the source of the closest/only ATM when I first moved here (That doesn’t seem right–wouldn’t there be some in bodegas?) and the razed spot where the White Castle stood. Once when I was 26 after a debauched night with some very young British boys (young enough that they were shocked when I said my age) I met in the Charleston, which I can’t believe is still the Charleston, I walked on Metropolitan all the way home to Ridgewood at 5am (roughly 3.6 miles–I just checked). At 45, I only have minutely better judgment but in 2018 I would definitely spring for a Lyft.

I was meeting Karen, whom I hadn’t seen since I interviewed her, and has lived nearby for 20 years like a good old-school Williamsburger, hanging on, waiting for a payoff. I currently know three other women in this position. I’m impatient. I would just move, but I’ve never had a rent stabilized apartment. 

Interboro is mildly confusing because they produce beers, nearly all IPAs, and spirits of all sorts. Most of the clientele were drinking beer, four 4oz tastings for $10, a bargain. 

The bartenders switched from The Cars at one point to Operation Ivy. “I haven’t heard this in a long time,” the long-haired one one said to the short-haired.  I hadn’t either, and it made me wonder when they became acquainted with this album since I listened to “Energy” in high school and these guys couldn’t have been older than kindergartners in 1989. Then again, I was only six when “Just What I Needed” came out and I’m perfectly familiar with the song. (Operation Ivy weren’t top 40 though…)

Age appropriate? Despite a mostly millennial clientele, I would say yes. There is an added layer to drinking at the same location where the beverages are produced that is nerdy in a way that could attract all ages. I did see a handsome white-haired man who could’ve been mid-40s or mid-50s with a woman of similar age and hair color. He looked like a British character actor who I couldn’t place until this morning. I forgot how in NYC when you see someone who might be someone, it’s not unreasonable that they are that person. This man was not Mark Bonnar, as it turned out, but I’m only mentioning this because I impressed myself that I even turned up this actor’s name with little to go on.