There was good and bad in that autumn of 2008 that seems already so far away. The Phillies won the World Series 4 games to 1 over the Tampa Bay Rays after a lot of great post-season baseball, but even the joy and celebration of that achievement was clouded for some of us by the nasty economic news of the preceding months and the resultant damage done to financial nest eggs and stock holdings.

It didn't register on the same scale of public moment and interest, certainly, but another event from that autumn has had a lingering effect on my life: a club that I'd frequented for several years closed. It wasn't a glamorous place or even scrupulously clean, but I was comfortable there, especially in the pool room. Not that I played much. But it was a good and companionable room to watch some shooting, and was the beginning ground of some much-valued friendships.

Those friendships continue, but in a necessarily different way, and usually individually rather than as a group, since we no longer have an established common gathering place. We manage to get together occasionally, although much texting and adjustment of schedules seems to occur first. We enjoy each other's game and company and laughter as before, but Philadelphia is, unfortunately, a very segregated city and it doesn't seem likely that we'll easily find a replacement spot so convenient and congenial as we had. It's been a loss of something good and happy. The passage of time and the development of new interests among us might well have brought us to the same point eventually, but that kind of thought doesn't really help much.