4 posts tagged “coffee”

    This week, assuming it started on the weekend, has been a very varied roller coaster. There has been a decent mix of good and bad going on and up until today the good outweighed the bad.

Friday :
    I finished my first full week at my new job somewhere between two and three. I could probably have stayed later but I had just received my first check. It wasn't much, but it was some cash in my pocket. I was happy and feeling very accomplished. I was excited to get home, get some beers and spend some "buddy time" with Jamie. She drives me to the bank to cash my check and we promptly pick up some good beers, a good bottle of wine and just to make sure we ingested enough alcohol a twelve pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon cans.
    Upon arriving home we kick back and start drinking, Jamie suggests we go out for some wings and who the hell am I to disagree. They were delicious wings with just the right amount of spice and it was just the right amount of food that it wouldn't interfere with our drinking.
    I built us a fire in the back yard, we drank and talked and just generally gave ourselves a good time with nothing but our friendship and a few drinks floating us along. I passed out on the couch watching Cruel Intentions much later that night and I was feeling okay but not great when Saturday morning rolled around.

Saturday :
    Jamie had a vicious hang over and was seriously dragging ass all morning. She threw up a little while I made a run for some coffee for me and muffins for us. The day was purposely lazy, we both sat around watched some television and didn't accomplish any of the hearty goals we had given ourselves the day before. I took a trip to the mall to go eyeball a knife set I plan to buy and price out some chef pants for work. A lazy day without much to speak of other than a feeling of contentment with my life.
    I had recently received an email from my ex girlfriend saying that she had been following this website and that I seemed very happy. I am and I have been, Tucson up until this day had been very good to me. I also was featured on two websites. One my roommate Ethan mentioned me and provided a link to me on his site, and the other was a piece dedicated to me by an old friend. I encourage you to check them both out if you are as interested in me as I am.
    With Jamie still not feeling well I had resigned that with all of this good feeling I was going to go out alone that night. I was going to have a couple of beers and people watch. I had full intention to do something I used to enjoy very much in my days in Baltimore. Without getting into too much detail I got drunk, drama ensued and I found my self generally annoyed with the world. I was so angry at the world in fact that I walked home with my anger on my back and found a random building along the way to take a piss on. This sort of passive aggressive lashing out is very satisfying to me, especially when I have a bladder full of cheap beer.
     Once again I passed out, this time in my bed and unfortunately alone, a little company would have made my night a lot more bearable, but like I said I passed out... so obviously I didn't lose any sleep over it.
   
Sunday:
    Another lazy day, not much of note happened at all. Jamie and I ate left overs, I caught up on Lost online. We called our mothers and made small talk for mothers day. Ethan came home from his conference in Prescott and Jamie got on a plane to Portland for an interview. At this point I would ask you to cross your fingers for Jamie to get the job, she is tremendously qualified, lets just hope this perspective employer realizes it. Anyway, I headed to bed as I had an early day at work, it was the first day we were opening for lunch service and I wanted to be well rested and alert.

Monday :
    With Jamie out of town she was kind enough to loan me her car as transport in replacement of my trusty bicycle and I arrived at work fifteen minutes early bright eyed and bushy tailed. After enjoying a cup of the free coffee owed to me just for showing up I immediately got to work with my trusty parter in crime at Italia Moni. In short we kicked ass, it wasn't horribly busy but her and I have a great vibe on the line and nothing slows us down. Once our day ended I offered Moni a ride home as I had the tools ( Jamie's car ) to provide a service of kindness for a coworker. I decide after dropping her off that in return for Jamie's kindness of loaning her car to me that I would stop and put in some gas so she wouldn't have to stop at six in the morning on her way to work after doing a 30 hour round trip to Portland.
    I find a gas station ( I'm still getting to know Tucson ) and after correcting my mistake of placing the gas tank on the opposite side from the pump I retrieve my wallet from my back pack to go and request ten bucks on pump three. To my dismay and the cause of my hatred for humanity at this exact moment my wallet was completely empty of cash. That morning when I stopped at Ike's for a muffin and coffee I had 85 dollars. My wallet had been emptied during the course of the day at work. Whomever made this trip into my bag did leave all of my cards and only took that which was untraceable. I sighed, my joy to work with the people I have been working with was instantly gone. I had been so pleased with the group that was hired along side of me and now suspected them all.
    Any and all good things that have happened to me in the past several days are gone. It wasn't much money, but it was all that I had. It wasn't much faith in humanity, but it was all that I had. I have two weeks until my next check, and a lifetime of mistrust.

Seven, Eight and Nine years ago when I lived in Baltimore, on a rare day off of work I went out to buy cigarettes and some beer to drink. I only had to walk four blocks to the Korean mini-mart, down and around the corner. I would pass my dog’s veterinarian and many doorways and shops on the way. I would pass people in every class of life. This particular day I passed a homeless man, sleeping in one of these many alcove doorways, at least that is what my brain led me to think. After gathering my twelve pack and camel lights I hit the sidewalk again in the opposite direction from before.

            There was new activity on the street during the minutes I was inside. That same homeless man, whom I had assumed sleeping in that doorway, was now being gathered into a large black sack with a zipper up the side. The paramedics treated it like a chore, generally ignoring the life that had passed while a policeman jotted some notes on a clip board and something made him laugh.

            I have never once told this story of how I walked past a dead man in the afternoon on the street, mainly for the reason this story holds no dignity for any of us, those who died, he who writes it and those who read. Today however and all week as a matter of fact I have been walking through and over a makeshift memorial in the middle of the street. Every day at least once and sometimes twice I grab my backpack, plug some music in my ears and head to the coffee shop “Ike’s”. I walk toward Speedway Blvd. head west for a block, push the magic button that makes cars stop cross and head another half of a block east.

            It would seem my footsteps have been crossing the location of where another person has died. The flowers appeared and photographs and notes, they may have been there for days and lost in my thoughts I wouldn’t know.

            His death is inconsequential to me, and has no bearing on my life, other than I feel a little bit selfish for not caring. A more sensitive person would I suppose, but I definitely don’t. This person whose name I couldn’t have known, has died and has since been autopsied, buried or burned. He might have been an abusive drunk or on his way to sainthood, but his death means nothing now, he is merely worm food.

            I’m not worried about dignity anymore. I feel that has fallen upon me with age. I don’t worry that I don’t have shame in admitting it, and I fart in public places. Death and life come and go, soon the nameless man who died on my path to caffeine will be forgotten by you and me the same. In fact now that I think more about what I am trying to say I don’t feel guilt for selfishness at all. I feel nothing. I am just a guy with a story to tell.

            If I die on the side of the road, please don’t waste the flowers and make the cop filling out the report laugh by telling a joke.

This is me leering at you across the room.

You are the coffee shop girl… blonde, tall and thin. You have an independent sensibility, and what looks like a red ink dove tattoo.

I am the stick, hovering over his laptop sipping his Mexican Organic.

This is the stuff that missed connections are made of.

This is me being shy.

I realize that the guy in the kitchen putting together sandwiches made from only the most organic ingredients is probably your boyfriend… and will be with you tonight.

I realize I don’t have the independent sensibility to have a red ink dove tattoo.

… but if I did…

I can tell you how it would go.

I wouldn’t have to have courage to ask you out, I would already have confidence… and you would react to that and smile in more than the way you do fishing for tips. I would give you my number and tell you to call me, taking a stand off position and creating mystery. While I do all this, the other coffee house patron eyes would land on you and me. Not holding their breath but biting the lip.

Some would say, “Daring.”

Others would say, “Ass.”

They all would be waiting to hear what you have to say next.

… and so would I…

I would already be turning on my heel heading toward the sugar and cream and you would lean over the counter and say, “You didn’t tell me your name!”

 I would say it as a matter of fact.

When you call me, the next day, and we employ the service of a different coffee girl somewhere else, you see a little bit more and maybe I will tell you sweet things… but the fact of the matter is that I want what I want and nothing more. I talk sweetly and smoothly on the road to that path, you give what you can to me… and that won’t last.

We try to make it work, good looking people should be together, but you don’t understand me and I don’t care about you.

I’m just trying to be honest, and save us some time.

I won’t ask for your number and you won’t get mine.