Without comment Michael handed me his phone last night to show me the announcement that Specialties has closed permanently. Specialties was a chain restaurant that catered mainly to office workers, offering both take-out and eat-in with excellent sandwiches and legendary cookies. One had been located quite close by the library for well over a decade, first as a small stand, then as a restaurant space in the downstairs plaza. I only had to go around the corner to pick up a paper-bag lunch with a Caprese and a pack of chips to eat at my desk. Very shiny place, scrubbed clean, but a came-of-age-in-the-80s umber rather than 50s-diner-white. It had the usual bland bought-by-the-yard framed pictures on its walls, and a dining area of brown leather booths that looked barely used even during the lunch rush. But the lines for takeout were always long, and the shelf of pick-up lunches always crowded with paper bags . Another familiar place and flavor gone.

Its more downmarket counterpart in San Francisco is — or was — Lee’s, a mainly serve-yourself takeout-joint. A typical Lee’s is — or was — a plain storefront with a small entrance that led into a dark, undecorated, surprisingly large space crowded with hot tables of chow mein, fried rice, chow fun, glass noodles egg-rolls, dim sum, kung pao chicken, pot stickers, fried chicken, stir-fried beef, spicy tofu and cold tables of salad fixings, fruit, hand-rolls, and nigiri. At least one wall would be dedicated to a long counter with a sneeze-guard and behind it workers in aprons waiting to serve up hot soup or sandwiches. Takeout from the tables was charged by the weight. You’d load up a stiff paper container, bring it to the check out counter near the front, and the Asian women — I don’t remember seeing any white person or any male working there — would weigh it on a scale before ringing it up. If white, shiny Specialties has gone under, can Lee’s survive?

I spoke to my mother on the phone this morning. She sounded good, though it was raining and she had to stay inside. Her shut-down project these days is transforming her back deck into a garden and bird sanctuary, with plants, feeders, perches, etc. She’s always loved birds. Lately a cow bird has been hanging around on the back of a chair near the sliding glass doors, apparently in love with its reflection. “He puffs up his feathers and makes noises and paces like he’s flirting. Every now and then he flies over to the feeder to eat but he always comes back. I just know it’s a male. A female bird wouldn’t have the time. Narcissus was a man. There’s a reason for that.”

Lee’s is also gone now.