Middle of The Day

Dear People in Coffee Shops in the Middle of the Day,

Hi! I have a lot of questions about you! See, like you, I am one of the people who can sometimes be found in a coffee shop in the middle of the day (even more so now that I'm on maternity leave), and I cannot help but wonder about my cafe squatting brethren. I mean, I know why I'm here...I'm here because I have an 8 month old and and sometimes I get bored being at home all day, therefore the need for a change of scenery, leads me to the closest coffee shop. But what about you? It’s almost 2 in the afternoon on a Thursday and you are in a coffee shop! Are you like me? I want to know what you are doing here and I want to know your story! I want to know everything about all of these people in the coffee shop in the middle of the day!

What are you doing? Are you on Facebook? Instagram? Pinterest? All three at once? Are you inventing a new social media website? Are you emailing with someone? Who? What are they saying? Are you writing? What are you writing? Is it a script? A book? An essay on coffee shop aesthetics? Are you lonely? Are you employed? Is this your job? Doesn't it annoy you to have that plate of crumbs sitting on the table for hours on end? Wouldn't you just go and throw it out by now? How much coffee have you had? Would you still come here even if they didn't have free WiFi? What did you do before free WiFi existed? Who is your favorite superhero? Do you like the music they are playing? Are you as creeped out by that one weird dude in the corner as I am?

It’s weird because if you go to a coffee shop in the middle of the day in just about any city (and probably some small towns, too) there will always people in that coffee shop. People you might see once and never again. People who could be visiting, people who could be your next door neighbor who you've never met. It’s a strange existence, the coffee shop life, because I have so many questions and am so very curious about all the other people I occasionally encounter during my coffee shop visits, and yet I never actually talk to anyone or ask anyone who anyone is or what anyone is doing. That’s the thing...we’re all here for a purpose, and whatever that purpose is, because we know there is one, it’s as though the cafe dwellers abide by a code. Everyone is often polite but has very little interaction with each other.

The people who go to coffee shops in the middle of the day are unified by their purpose and desire to be in the coffee shop and protected by this shared intention, even though some of us are strangers and we’ll never meet and I’ll never know what you are writing on your computer and what music you are listening to and where you came from and where you are going to. We are strangers yet we are all so alike in one way or another and that's cool.

Warm regards,
Janet


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