Coffee

For Day 18 of NaPoWriMo this year, the prompt is to write an ode to life’s small pleasures. My first cup of coffee of the day is one of those for me. Loosely inspired by what is becoming one of my favourite poems, Wendell Berry’s The Peace of Wild Things. \\\* When the darkness of night lifts and I awake to the dreariness of existing in this place, forgetting where Yesterday ends and Today begins to slip into Tomorrow, I reach for this worn mug, its stained sides and chipped edges reassuring in their durability. At first light I lose myself to the muscle memory of returning and find joy in small sips.

Two mornings during a typical work week, I make a pit stop at the Starbucks in Union Square. Over the course of the last year, it has become apparent that quite a few people have a similar routine. I now recognise — and share the odd nod with — an older gentleman who usually arrives at the same time I do and unfailingly buys an espresso machiato which he proceeds to nurse for all of thirty minutes before shooting off to what I assume must be work. ...

Over-priced perhaps but this is very quickly becoming my Happy Place where I pause briefly before heading into the bedlam of work… #SteadyHabits

At the coffee machine, catching up with the new, younger engineer who shares my first name, he asks me what my surname is. I give him the anglicized, easy to pronounce version which doesn’t satisfy him. He asks me how I would pronounce it - cue five attempts, after each of which he fails colossally to reproduce the sounds I make somehow ending up adding, subtracting and transposing syllables through his various attempts. ...

For the prompt Breakfast at the Magpie Tales Breakfast, 1921, Fernand Leger hold your head- steady between your hands; bow your head as though in supplication- and let the strong, sweet scent slowly wafting up- hit you. see your face- faint silhouette, three day stubble, matted hair- and tired eyes reflected in the cup and bow in reverence to its quickening power. wrap your hands around its base and feel the warmth. drink deep, swirl it's dregs in your mouth's backparts and let the waves of unfettered joy course through your veins give in - and kneel in full surrender to the joy of your dark, black cup.

Strong coffee might be great for your mental health after all; if this research proves to be applicable to humans that is. Via BBC News