As we approach the one-year mark of COVID-19’s devastating arrival in NYC, there is no shortage of stories eulogizing much-loved restaurants, bars, and venues that have succumbed to the pandemic’s successive assaults on the industry. But, just off the Ridgewood side of the L tracks, one local bar is persevering in spite of it all. This time last year, Jorge Mdahuar and Jon Gneezy had just celebrated an anniversary of an altogether different nature. “They always say after the three-year mark of owning a bar you’re in the clear,” Mdahuar says. “You can breathe after that.” But just two months after reaching this milestone, the duo were forced to lay off half their staff and shutter their dining room to the public. The hospitality industry was in freefall.