The Coffee Shop Chronicles No. 22

You, as the reader may not realize how wonderful it is to me, the writer, to read the words "This was your best story yet." But there is a flip side to that as well, "This was your best story yet" are also the scariest words I can read. Because eventually the bar can't go any higher without taking a step back.

I tried to write a chronicle last week but I also tried to write it at the place where the last "best story yet" was written. Of course the cast of characters wasn't the same, it was kind of slow in there that day due to a nasty, rainy day outside. But the truth be told, my heart just wasn't in it. Our family had suffered a great loss the previous week. We had to put our oldest golden retriever down due to failing health. He was Mallory's dog, and thankfully she was able to come home from school for the week to spend some time with him before we had to say goodbye. He had a larger than life personality and is greatly missed by all of us.

So instead of writing a chronicle that day I worked on some other writing projects and was productive  in that regard. After I left the coffee shop it had stopped raining so I decided to do some country back roads exploring with my camera. I felt more refreshed when I returned home than I had been in quite a while.

For this week's chronicle I have returned to The Sparrows, an adorable coffee shop that I visited last spring. You can read the chronicle from that visit here.

I arrived at the coffee shop at five minutes to nine. It was a dreary, rainy day outside, so the warmth and comfort of the familiar coffee shop was inviting as I stepped through the door. To my delight Miss Willow was behind the counter. She still had the sweet, soft voice that I remembered but the poor darling was also experiencing a case of the hiccups and trying to deal with them as delicately as possible. She joked that it was so hard to focus on what she was doing while she was trying to get rid of them. Still she prepared my chai latte perfectly, paired with a chocolate chip scone. They have the best scones here.

At this coffee shop I don't feel bad sitting at one of the lovely round, worn wood tables that seat three or a cozy four. None of the tables are that big, all inviting intimate conversation rather than interaction with technology. Even though they do have wifi available and some people were there alone and on their laptops, technology didn't overwhelm as it has other places I have been.

I brought my daughter Mallory here once this past summer, she is also a big lover of coffee shops and this place is very much her style. That day it had been very quiet at the coffee shop, located near a few different local colleges the student crowd was gone for the summer. Mallory knew I was coming here and curious as to what kind of guys frequent this coffee shop. Her style would be to meet a guy at a coffee shop as opposed to a bar. Sadly on this day there were very few guys here and the ones that were here were more professor age. There was one cute guy but he was already there with a girl. Then I noticed one young man at a table near one of the big front windows, he must have snuck in when I wasn't looking. He could have potentially been cute but it was hard to tell what was hiding under his ginormous bushy beard. Maybe he is a hunter since deer season is fast approaching and he did have on a Carhardt Jacket. Probably not Mallory's type though since she is not a fan of Bambi killers. 

The loud, fast talking thirty something guy that was at the table next to me with two college age girls seemed to be tied to some religious organization. He talked about church and different community activities but all in a Televangelist kind of way. Too much, too loud. And then he started talking about what big teeth he has and how nobody can tell how crooked they are because of how big they are. Run Little Red Riding Hoods run!

Nope, nobody here I would want for a future son-in-law. Maybe I will need to visit a local Starbucks soon to see who is hanging out there. 

I started a new photography class this week with Ali Edwards called the Lens of Joy. Ali is an amazing documenter of her life, something I want to make a more conscience effort to do in my own life. I brought my camera with me to this coffee shop, I have taken photos here before so I felt completely comfortable doing this. Since writing and coffee shop writing in particular are a big part of my life, I want to document these meaningful moments. 

I also love the fact that although Ali takes a lot of photographs she doesn't consider herself a professional photographer, she embraces imperfection. A girl after my own heart. I love what Ali says here:

"I have to start by telling you that I only know

what I know. And what I know has come from

practice, reflection, making a whole lot of mistakes

and from living with a camera almost always accessible.

I'm a fan of slow learning - of adopting one new thing

at a time and practicing it over and over again."

You will probably be seeing more of me in my posts as I work on being present in my work, adding the human factor that is often missing.