Notes from the Last Diner on Route 9
Six months of coffee refills before the highway bypass opens.
The waitress knows the bypass will kill the place. She keeps the coffee coming anyway, on the theory that a good last year is still a year.
The sign out front still says OPEN 24 HOURS, though it has not been true since the night shift cook retired. Inside, the regulars have started arriving earlier, as if trying to get more use out of a place that is running out of time.
I asked the owner what she would do when the new highway finally opened and the exit ramp that fed her parking lot for forty years quietly closed. She shrugged and refilled a cup that did not need refilling.
There is a particular kind of hospitality that only shows up at the end of something, unhurried and a little too generous. I have been driving out of my way for it more than I care to admit.
