This story originally appeared on the Gents Cafe Newsletter. You can subscribe here.
The meeting ended with the familiar chime and the words, “Take care,” before the gallery of faces vanished from my screen. I looked up from my desk toward the Washington Monument standing beyond my apartment window. It was 4:35 on a Friday afternoon in October 2020. Outside, Washington was unusually still. Inside, my apartment had become my office, conference room, and coffee shop, all within four walls.
For months, work and life had occupied the same space, separated only by the closing of a laptop. I needed a better way to take care of myself.
At five o’clock, I shut down my computer, silenced my work phone, and tucked it into the drawer under my desk. My notebook disappeared into my briefcase with the satisfying click of its brass latch. Only then did my evening begin.
Sounds of familiar voices filled the apartment. Van Morrison. Herbie Hancock. James Taylor. I struck a match from the box I’d pocketed at my favorite French restaurant in the city and lit the candle. Just as the flame settled, the first saxophone note drifted through the room, announcing the workweek was finally over. I straightened the apartment and approached my home bar. Ice settled into a rocks glass with a crisp crack. Bitters followed. Then sugar. A strip of orange peel slowly disappeared beneath the surface. Week after week, I adjusted the proportions in search of an Old Fashioned that felt entirely my own.
Drink in hand, I settled into the leather chair by the window as light from the setting sun drifted across the city. The emails, budget inquiries, and endless virtual meetings slowly loosened their grip. There was nowhere to be, no one expecting a reply. Just music, the quiet clink of ice against crystal, and an hour reserved for no one but myself. Somewhere between the first sip and the last slow movement of melting ice around the glass, I stopped thinking about work altogether.
What began as a response to lockdown became something far more enduring. The Old Fashioned was never really the point, nor was the music or the candle. Together they became a ritual; a small but intentional boundary between obligation and presence.
The world has long since reopened, DC has given way to a small New England town, and the apartment to a house. But every so often, on a Friday evening, I still return to that same chair. I pour the same drink, put on the same playlist, and allow myself the luxury of my own company. In a world that encourages us to be perpetually available, I’ve come to believe there is quiet strength in becoming unavailable, if only for an hour.
For me, the solo happy hour was never about drinking alone. It was about creating the space to enjoy my own company. And I’ve come to believe there’s nothing lonely about it.
