Afternoon
Musings in a Coffee Shop
By:
Rodolfo Perez
This
is for Brian Kwok, we care buddy.
There
are things that are better left unsaid in the coffee shop. Live to be pure, but
to yourself, not to everyone else. Believe in the idea that what is believed is
in perception of what is never found. What does it mean to never be found? Is
the man who seeks privacy through action and pure heartache a lonely man? Or
has he fulfilled his purpose in life? How surreal coffee shops are. You walk
in, and there, sitting at a table or stool or wooden wicker chairs, you will
find people. These people sit, some writing, some reading, and some talking to
their mothers, others their partners. They sit in close proximity to each
other, yet they have, and most likely want, little to do with each other. They
are in their own worlds, away from the brash sounds of the coffee making machine
or the coffee maker. The people sit, working, stopping for the occasional sip
of their drink or a quick bite of their muffin. These people may be working on
the next great poem, or song, or screenplay, yet we ignore them. We assume their
creative endeavors, and take them for being beings of lost power. A power many
of the people I see sitting once had. Some may have a power to grab the
attention through their art, or shift that attention away from themselves or
the sake of solitude, but even then, how long will that last? When will these
people wake up one fine morning, to find that they can’t capture the minds and
imaginations of anyone but themselves? When will they walk into a coffee shop
like this expecting that power to come back to them, only to find that it’s a
new day, and there’s something new to look at. The person sits and waits for
the inspiration to come back. The person sits for some time, but the one thing
they feared has become a reality. The person sits, reflecting on what there is
left to do in a place like this. They pay for what the place was made for, and
they sit for a while longer, then they leave.
P.E.N.T.C.I.
