Spending time at coffee shops sends warming sparkles to my soul. It’s being alone with a book, writing materials, and hours stretched before me. Present in a space where there are no laundry piles to distract, chores needing doing, and children requiring attention is restful and re-energizing. I love being surrounded by the rich smell of coffee beans and pleasant hum of other workers in their own, I hope, happy niche. I always put my earbuds in for some excellent background music (thank you, Spotify) and settle in contentedly to doing what I adore.
Only, sometimes, the People of Starbucks rouse me out of my pleasant inward coziness and surprise me.
This particular morning, after dropping the children off at their Monday classes I headed to Starbucks to use my free coffee reward, anxious to get started on writing and craving the taste of a breve flat white on my tongue.
The Starbucks was small and limited in seating, but featured a large farmhouse table with chairs all around. Every spot in the cafe was crammed, save two seats at the table where a group of senior couples was enjoying a chat. I love older people, and hearing them talk and reminisce in the background is just the comfortable atmosphere I crave around coffee cups. I asked with a smile, pointing to a chair near a white-haired lady, “Do you mind?” and they jovially permitted me to join their table.
I set down my lidded coffee cup and managed, by some feat mysterious, to spill it on the table. A Tall doesn’t seem terribly Tall until you spread out half of its creamy hot mixture before a gaggle of elderly gents. Then it seems like a ridiculous amount of liquid, indeed.
One of the gents hobbled out of his seat, insisting he help me clean it up, and in the small area around our table, we bumped into each other and everyone else standing in line in an attempt to clean up the mess. 100 napkins later, at least I had a few hot sips left.
Their conversation resumed, and I began to settle into my muse.
That’s when the coughing started. Some poor soul, seated three feet from me, had a tickle in his throat. A tickle in the throat of a 250+ pound man over 6’2″ lends itself to a small roaring hurricane that shook my table and blasted on my face. After 10 minutes of this I began to desperately search through my bag for gum, a cough drop, anything to relieve this poor man’s throat. Finding nothing, I began to mentally ask Hurricane Cougher to please go home, tuck himself in bed, and drink some hot lemon tea. Occasionally he’d take his hacking outside or gulp down copious amounts of water, only to return and resume the miserable cycle.
The seniors at my table left, probably to get flu shots, and I was soon joined by a beautiful woman in her surely-twenties. Immediately I named her Audrey because her style was French and chic and expertly poised. I was insanely curious to know how she kept her red lipstick perfectly intact while she sipped coffee. Or was she actually sipping? I began to suspect the coffee was somehow floating into her mouth when she raised the cup.
My hands poised over the keyboard, I noticed her manicure and wondered if she took vitamins (and what kind?) since her nails looked extremely healthy and that’s when I realized my polish was in urgent need of removal. Also, I must stop doing dishes. I began to dream up scenarios in which she was a fashion blogger, home stylist, travel journalist, or French Spy.
Clearly, with Hurricane Cougher on my left and Beautiful Audrey on my right, I was accomplishing very little.
That’s when Harold sat down opposite of me, aheming and shifting his cane and generally rumbling as very old men with suspenders are wont to do. After a few sips, he settled his gaze on me and inquired, not rudely, “Well what are you doing?”
I eyed Beautifully Audrey in my peripheral. Undoubtedly she was completing massive amounts of work on her laptop while the photo I had been editing for the last thirty minutes was still staring at me wanly from the screen. I bet if my polish was brightly fresh my fingers would move faster. I wish he’d asked her, because I would like to know which of my scenarios was correct.
“Oh,” I answered. “I’m working on editing a photo.”
“Why?”
Uh.
“It’s not the best quality, and I’d like to make it look better.”
I clicked furiously on my keyboard and edited the photo-taken on my iPhone two years prior-as much as I could manage to do. This went on for a few minutes when finally Harold asked, rather loudly, “Can I see what in the heck you’re doing?”
I’m pretty sure the coughing abruptly stopped and Audrey’s fingers paused in order so they, and the entire coffee shop, could hear my reply. I turned my humble little Acer Chromebook around so Harold could see my picture of the Tower of London. At his prompting, I explained why I was editing the photo. It was for a blog post about my favorite spots in London.
Harold did not know what a blog was when he entered Starbucks, but by the time he left he was robustly informed. We discussed why one would edit photos in the first place, his trip to Germany, where his daughters lived (east and west coasts), and how old Europe is. He asked whether or not I was married, and sputtered into his coffee when I cheerfully told him I was the mother of three children including two teenagers. “But you aren’t older than 15 yourself!” he roared in amazement. Finding the older I get and the more everyone ten or so years my junior looks like a baby, I sympathized with his feelings. First the word “blog,” and then this.
We had a comfortable silence.
“This coffee tastes like charcoal,” he grimaced, staring down into his cup.
I suggested he start his own blog, about good coffee and exotic travel. He smiled. When, a few moments later, Harold and his cane prepared to depart we cordially wished each other a good day. I watched him shuffle out the door, having thrown his half-finished cup in the trash with gusto.
Being reminded of the time, I realized I needed to leave without finishing much of anything. Yet I felt richer for the experience, and grateful to have my world adjusted a little, thanks to the People of Starbucks.
Have you had any memorable coffee shop interactions? Do tell!!
