Grab a Matchbook From Your Favorite Spot and Thank Me Later

There is one place, though, where the Standard lives on: my matchbook collection . On the front there’s a burnt orange, Rothko-style square lurking behind the words “JAZZ STANDARD.” On the back you’ll find a graphic of a trumpet, right above the club’s address and phone number. I couldn’t recall ever picking up this matchbook, but I imagine a handful might have been displayed by the entrance or on the low tables downstairs. Either way, here was proof that the club once existed. I couldn’t resurrect the Jazz Standard, which originally opened in 1997, but at least I had this modest memorial to its life. Since my early 20s, I’ve been amassing a collection of matchbooks from places I’ve gone, many of them now shuttered as casualties of the pandemic — a restaurant in my hometown of Portland, Ore., where I went for wood-fired pizza; the bar where I debriefed with friends and family after seeing movies; my old co-working space.