It Happened in a Pub
The Lucky Lab is marked by a vast bar that must run thirty feet north to south, and yet, testament to the communal spirit that animates Southeast Portland, people wait in an orderly line in the gap between two cash registers. Founded thirty years ago, the Lab is located in the Buckman neighborhood, an enclave of Portlandia within Portlandia so sapphire blue local politicos call it “the Kremlin.” The brewery has been an emblem of the neighborhood since it was founded there in the distant grunge era. On any given half-temperate afternoon or evening, the covered patio will feature a menagerie of four-leggeds panting under tables while their human companions sip beer above. Inside, groups gather around board games or pitchers of beer on a rumpus room of second-hand tables and chairs. You might even find a gathering of the local Democratic Socialists discussing wage disparities if you’re lucky.
One evening in the waning days of December, my friends and I staged an after-work get-together. Mid-session, two of us found ourselves waiting in that orderly line. As you do, we struck up a collegial conversation with two women in front of us that lasted until they reached the front of the line. In an inversion of typical cultural norms, in drinking establishments it’s almost considered rude to ignore a stranger you’re standing next to. Bars encourage people to forge momentary social bonds, which make them quite special in a country where mistrust is increasingly the default position. In bars, you look for common ground, usually finding it through a joke or two.
On that particular night, my friend and I got our beers, rejoined our group and fell into the flow of conversation. Some time later—could have been a few minutes or two hours, in the manner of bar time—we looked up to see the two women from the line. They were proffering a pitcher of Scottish Holiday, a full, malty winter ale. I tuned into this development late and the pitcher was being deposited on the table by the time I noticed what has happening. Their group was breaking up and donning coats, and I missed why they had this spare pitcher of beer. But we had spoken, and our table wasn’t far from theirs, so they decided to leave us with the extra ale. We took pleasure in this unexpected generosity, and they took pleasure in our pleasure. It was one of those things that happens sometimes, if you’re living right, in bars.
The mood in Portland has been a little dark lately. We have been held up as a shining example of everything that is wrong with certain kinds of American cities, and all the favorable attention we received pre-Covid has curdled into unrelenting negative press. Locals complain the city is “over,” and for the first time in decades, Portland’s population declined. Since I arrived in 1986, people have complained that “Old Portland” was disappearing, but now that worry carries an existential quality.
All of that is true, but it’s not, you know, true. Cities evolve and change, but the best of them keep their essence. Portland has always been a scruffy little town of oddballs. It is idealistic and communal and quirky. If you want to experience Old Portland, go to the Lucky Lab. It’s the kind of place where a conversation might turn into a pitcher of beer. Portland is no more over than beer or pub-going and that picture at the top of the post is proof.