Losing a Community

It is with great sadness but many thanks that I write this post about our local brewery closing at the end of the year - https://www.ashtonbrewing.com/

       Opening just as Covid shut the country down was a huge hurdle to jump. Many regulars from the previous brewery at this location placed our orders online and queued up in our vehicles to pick up six packs and cases daily as we wanted to ensure the brewery’s success. We didn’t know it then, but we were starting to form the community of Ashton Brewing.

       As soon as we were free to move about the country, the bar was filled with local beer lovers eager to be with other people after being shut in, and thirsting for some good beer. The brewery has since become more than just a brewery. It’s a gathering place for the growing number of regulars as well as those in search of a good pint. We have become a community of our own and many have become good friends all thanks to our mutual love of beer and having Ashton to hang out at. One can walk in pretty much any time and run into at least someone else from our extended brewery family. You may not know everyone’s name but there’s always a familiar face there and that’s what makes it so special.

       I’ll give a personal example. We had my 60th birthday party there a couple of weeks ago on a Thursday night. We planned on having several friends with us, but it turned into a much bigger fiesta as they told other friends who stopped by, several Thursday night regulars joined the celebration, the owners hung out, still other brewery friends and beertenders jumped in, and a few familiar faces we hadn’t seen in quite a while just happened to come in. One of which got the entire place to sing happy birthday to me. We wound up basically taking over the back part of the brewery – thanks Steve & Donna for letting us! Having all those people there to celebrate my milestone was truly humbling and they made it into a very special night – one of my best birthday celebrations ever. Having received the news of the impending closing a few days before, it was bittersweet, but a memory I will cherish as what made this place so special to so many of us.

       When the news broke, the unanimous reaction of all of us regulars was that it was sad to lose the beer (and at a place we could walk to!), sad to lose Steve and Donna as part of our town, but the worst part was losing the Ashton Brewing community. Yes, we will be able to meet up with this group, but it will have to be planned - we will all miss walking in and seeing regulars whom you could set your watch and calendar by, friends who happen to be there, the beertenders and owners, and newcomers who share our love of good beer. That is what turned our local brewery into a community of its own.

            Thank you, Steve and Donna, for creating something much bigger than your brewery.

www.RetiredandInspiredat55.com  11-18-2024