Restaurant owner reflects on the lasting impact of the pandemic

Geoff Bennett:

We now continue our look at the COVID pandemic five years after it started, hearing from Americans with a range of opinions on that time and the government's response.

Amna Nawaz:

Tonight, a reflection from someone who spent much of his life working at his family's restaurant, only to have to shut it down when COVID hit.

Michael Fratantuono, Former Manager, Sunset Restaurant:

My name is Michael Fratantuono. I was one of the managers of our family-owned Sunset Restaurant in Glen Burnie, Maryland.

Our family bought the business back in 1960. I started working there in 1989, and I was there for 32 years. Sunset Restaurant was a family-style restaurant that anyone could bring their folks in, young, old.

We had heard all this stuff going on in the news about the COVID stuff. And then the day before St. Patrick's Day, we were told, shut it down; 90 percent of our employees, we had to lay off. And after that, we had to rewrite the wheel on doing carryouts and food.

After we opened back up, we were at 50 percent. We were losing $10,000 a month. So we brought the accountants in, and the accountants sat down with us and said: "Guys, I'd close it up if I was you."

It was like someone just knocked me upside the head, knowing that something that I had always had my heart and soul into, all I had known was the Sunset all my life. As a child growing up, everything was that building. It was a lump in my throat.

I think things were locked down too much, too fast, too soon without research. Now that I know what's going on, hindsight, money morning quarterback, it shows you that there's a lot of conspiracy going on with the governments. It shows that you can't always trust these guys.

January of '20, my father passed. And if he was still alive during this — all this COVID, it would have killed him. He really would have gotten very, very mad for the government to come in and shut you down for something that we really don't know, we don't understand. And you're stuck holding the bag.

I blame the federal government. I blame Fauci. I blame all the bureaucrats at the National Institution of Health. Knowing what I know now, my opinion, knowing that I'm not a doctor, treat it like the normal flu. These guys are telling us to do this and to do that, stand six foot apart. Wear a mask.

It was all a bunch of hoo-ha. All things happen for a reason. It probably worked out better for my family. The guy that was selling us our insurance for the building came to me and said, hey, what are you going to do afterwards? You want to try selling insurance? Sure.

Sales are sales. I have been in sales for 40-plus years. So I wanted to try that. I will try that. And I have been doing that since. I'm not making a ton of money, but I'm making money. My life is easier. My life is more relaxed. I'm off every night and I'm off every weekend.

I went out on Saturday and was playing golf with family members up here, and we were driving the tee. And I said: "So, this is what it's like to be off on a Saturday." Never got to do it.

I do not like going down to Glen Burnie, Maryland, anymore. It's kind of like bad blood. I just don't want to go back. It hurts. It hurts.