When I was a teenager, I desperately wanted to be a goth so very bad. Having controlling parents, however, the closest I could get away with were Cure cassette tapes and late-night visits to area diners, always filled with dark-souled youths smoking cloves that would never get to know me in the slightest; I’d sit in the corner, reading an utterly pretentious book, hoping someone—anyone—would talk to me.
But they never did.
Still, out of those few “after midnight” dives that were around then, my favorite was always Mama Lou’s, 1421 N. Moore Ave. in, well, Moore. Even though I was painfully ignored there too, at least they always had a cheap steak for me to nosh on after work, probably a reason not only goths, but punks and skaters as well, let me rot in my eternal loneliness...
Having not been there for around 25 years, I decided to stop by to see how they were holding up and, with the momentary exception of any and all customers, when I walked in it still looked the same to me: same booths, same kitchen, same American flag pinned to the wall. Honestly, the only thing different were the prices, raised a bit higher thanks to two decades worth of inflation.