disaster amnesiac: November 2023

Wednesday, November 8, 2023

RIP Luna's Cafe

A few evenings back, Mr. and Mrs. Amnesiac watched Youtuber Metal Leo's recent video, in which he walked around downtown Sacramento. We marveled at his shots of empty store fronts all over River City's once bustling town center. What the hell happened? This is the capitol city of a state that touts itself as one of the largest economies in the world, yeah? As I recall, that area was often kind of sketchy in an inner city kind of way, but restaurants, markets, and small businesses filled its breadth. It seems that now, not so much. Is it going too far to blame Gavin Newsom? Perhaps he's just a symptom of some greater force. As my pal Charlie, with whom I hung out the last time that I was in Sacramento, would posit: Powers and Principalities.

Viewing Metal Leo's clip led me to reminiscing about Luna's Cafe, a spot not quite in downtown Sac, but close enough. Disaster Amnesiac did a Google search and was saddened to see that Luna's closed permanently, earlier this year. My memories of Luna's are all fond. In it, I discovered a place that was friendly to visual artists and musicians, along with being a purveyor of quality food and drink. I heard some really neat music there, saw some arresting visual art on the walls there, ate and drank tasty menu items there. Additionally, the place had a community. As I type these words, I can recall the interesting people who always seemed to be at Luna's, whenever had occasion to trek there from points west of Sacramento. These were fascinating, artistic, creative, non-pretentious people, and it was always wonderful to see them and to speak with them. I hope that they are doing well. I hope that Art Luna is doing well. Again, I'm saddened by this turn of events, but, hey, it seems to be sort of par for the course at this point that I'm eulogizing tons more. It sucks. Luna's Cafe did not suck. It seems that, given the amount of pure suckage that society throws out there, that's not a bad obituary at all. So long, Luna's Cafe, and thanks for the memories.