The lady delivered a simple note of thanks — and then a big surprise for staff at Luna Sea restaurant in Yachats

By QUINTON SMITH/YachatsNews.com

The women is regular enough at Luna Sea Fish House in Yachats that owner Robert Anthony recognizes her as a local. But not quite familiar enough that he can attach a name.

She came in about 5 o’clock Sunday evening. She inquired about the start of the crab season, and bought one to take home.

Then, “Here, Robert, I want you to have this,” the woman said, handing him an envelope.

Inside was a note. Three sentences. Neat, capital letters.

“You and your staff have shown such great attitude and willingness through this pandemic. Please thank them all & best for the rest of 2021! Hope your good work will help keep all of us open!”

With the note was $1,000. Ten crisp, new $100 bills.

“I about fell over,” Anthony said later Sunday night. “I thought about refusing it, but I saw where her heart is.”

Instead, it went into the restaurant’s tip jar to be distributed to Luna’s 20 employees.

As with any restaurant, it hasn’t been an easy 10 months for Anthony, Luna and its staff as they adapted to coronavirus restrictions, the shutdowns and whiplash of openings and partial closures. There’s fewer employees. No breakfast service. Only two inside tables. But still, 2020 was a strong year financially because of the restaurant’s popularity and ability to offer good, simple takeout seafood meals.

But it has been a grind.

Until the little lift Sunday night.

“There was a lot of ‘Oh wow’,” Jeremy Blumenshine, who has waited tables for nine of Luna’s 12 years, said of the staff’s reaction. “It just shows that people care about this place and its people, that we work hard and care about what we do. This was amazing.”

And it was a first for Anthony as well.

“My heart just feels so good,” he said.