The Culture of Coffee Part 2

Coffee used to be an adult thing, you had to be a certain age before could go into a coffee house and order. Until then, you had to go to a Perkins and get their sorry excuse for coffee. But, more frequently I see these young kids, who never tip, come in and spend hours and hours in the confines of the store. They are loud, obnoxious and overly mean to each other. If they are in a disagreement they are sure to make the whole store aware of it. Sometimes they are there all night, and I find myself wondering, “Don’t these kids have homes? Don’t their parents want to eat dinner with them?” Resoundingly, the answer appears to be no, and if they were my kids I wouldn’t want them around either. The coffee shop is usually filled with two types of people, older couples just having a cup of Earl Grey or college kids trying to study. Conversations with other patrons leads me to believe that not only are these kids spoiling my work day, but the entire coffee shop environment. Caught at a weird age, when one has a foot in childhood and another in adulthood, behavior becomes erratic. Not only do these little shits annoy everyone, they work hard to befriend the employees in an effort to get free things? I honestly was in shock the day one asked for a free drink and I had to explain to him that someone has to pay for this drink, and he ended up with a nice glass of crystal clear water, complete with a lemon. As Confucious said… “There is no free lunch”
While working, I usually consume vast amounts of coffee. Cup after cup I suck down the brown liquid, and once I am done, I walk back to my place and quickly follow all my caffeine binge up with a lengthy nap. I suppose my caffeine junkiness has caused me to be immune to its effects. Now I just need it to feel normal. I see the same trait in myself, as I see in countless others who pass through my place of work.
Fiends, junkies, addicts…They all come together at the coffee shop. People anxiously, or sometimes way too happy approach the register and slip me some cash, and say “Triple espresso con pana” and then quickly they find a place to sit and fidget to no end while you craft their beverage. The average coffee addict is a litter bug by nature. A guy comes in and has some sort of homework with him, he sets up his laptop and lays out his books at one of the booths. He then reaches into the pocket of his jeans, and pulls out some change. Pennies fly loose as he quickly removes his hand, he hand me a neat stack of quarters. “Small dark roast, please?” His eyes are stuck into his darkened sockets, his blonde hair still suffering from weeks of not combing and his shirt buttons don’t match up. I had him the cup of coffee and he twitters away. He isn’t content in just creating a neat pile of trash and disposing it by themselves. The table resembles a disaster area after they have left the premises. One can see the signs that a coffee addict was there, by the inability to get all the sugar in the cup, as one can see how they missed the cup, frequently, by the amount of sugar on the table. More than not, there are often shredded pieces of napkin spread everywhere, and broken stir sticks, or straw wrappers ripped apart. Never is any of this mess picked up or orchestrated in a way that would make it easy to clean up. The mess is spread all across the table, and coffee is spilt everywhere because they were jittering so much just to bring the cup to their lips.
These people, flawed as they may be, are my livelihood. The rewards are there, you just have to wait from them, amongst the weird behavior and non-tippers. Look past the demanding nature and extravagant orders. The benefits do come and when they come they make you feel like an artist of sorts. A master of the espresso machine, who composes beautiful orchestras of milk, sugar, and coffee. It will occur on some particularly frustrating day after a long rush. Some guy will come up and get your attention and just as you expect him to ask for a glass of water, he’ll say “Hey, that Espresso con pana you made me the other day, was so damn good.” What can I say to that? I usually give him a small nod, and just say “Thanks”