Wanted: Public meeting place for writers’s Group.
Must have tables with seating for up to six writers and their laptops or journals. Lingering long over literary conversation encouraged. Good lighting and electric outlets a plus. Drinking and dining options should include coffee, tea, beer, wine, and gastro-pub fare. Vegan or vegetarian options required and deserts a must. Only Central Columbus, Ohio locations with ample parking need apply. Independent businesses with artsy, funkey, vintage appeal prefered.
My writers’ group has been homeless for a year now. We first organized during a cold November at the MoJoe Lounge of German Village. It was a quirky gastro pub next door to The Book Loft, one of the largest independent bookstores in the country. It started as a weekly write-in location for NaNoWriMo and there were a dozen or so of us. A handful of us really bonded and decided to keep meeting every Thursday ever since. We had a waitress we got to know and considered her one of us. Several of us wrote her into some of our projects. Sure, sometimes the MoJoe would change up the menu or redecorate but the it was always Home. Until it suddenly closed for renovations last April and reopened as a Staufs coffee roasters and bakery. Our MoJoe was gone!
We wanted to like Staufs. It is a great coffee house but it closes an hour earlier and doesn’t offer any meal fare, just baked goods. We tried the original Max&Erma’s just up the street in it’s historic location, but were uncomfortable lingering in a restaurant that needed to turn over tables quickly for the wait staff to earn a living. We tried the Strongwater Pub and thought we found our new home, but the management quickly decided that if our group wanted to take advantage of their funky, little alcoves, then they would take advantage of our funky, little group and started charging us an extra fee to eat there.
We tried restaurants, pubs, and cafés, all over Columbus looking for a spot with the perfect mix of the amenities we have come to love. Maybe we just miss the old MoJo too much and are just too hard on other establishments because they aren’t the MoJoe.
My writers’ group has resigned itself that it will take time before we feel at home in a new place but we still have to find the new place to grow into now that we’ve lost our MoJoe.
How about it my Columbus Wander-Writers? Where is your favorite place to hang out with friends and write or talk literature? What do you look for in a public writing location?
Read ~ Write ~ Wander
~Angie