When I or anyone else looks back on my life, I want it to be known that I spent quite a bit of time at coffee houses in my mid-thirties. It wasn't as easy as it sounds.
I first had to overcome the social anxiety well-ingrained in my youth. No blame here -- my mantras for these things being "whatever happened happened" and "I will accept those who have accepted me." And I proclaimed these mantras before wind, trees, clouds, and flowing water, so I have sanctified my oaths to the best of my abilities.
I don't know what made me first go to the Gray Owl, my starter coffee house. The event is simply lost to imperfect memory. However, I remember how nervous I was. I will say one thing in favor mental blocks: once you finally do something contrary to them you feel an elation, like you are getting away with something.
After my first few times going through the nervousness to elation cycle, I learned the rhythms of the place. Norman is very much a college town, so I wouldn't want try to find seat in the early afternoon when the University of Oklahoma is in session. However, it's easy enough to get a spot in the morning. And, of course, you can have relatively free run of any coffee house when the students are on break. Other people have figured this out as well, so a place is never completely empty for long, moving toward a beautiful social equilibrium. I like having people around, which was a little bit to my surprise. My childhood (both atoned for, as well as forgiven) left me thinking my best life would be as a spiritual hermit. It turns out that was wrong. While the snip-its of conversation and people watching afforded at a coffeehouse are not in themselves all I need for an effective dose of human contact, it's pretty close. Remarkably close. . . perhaps it warrants further investigation. The social aspect of a place expands my world and adds on to my dimensions, if just a little bit. It's nice to know I can consciously call upon the knowledge of a coffee house as a good place when I need to, something that was not in my arsenal for all of my twenties.
Lastly, I had to overcome my tendency toward cheapness. Like all people far along on the frugal/cheapness spectrum, I like to identify as frugal, but I have to admit I often lapse into cheap. So, when our new Central Library opened in Norman and it had great deal more seating, I thought that I might not ever go to a coffee house on my own again. The flaw with this line of thinking is that more people know how to follow the norms of a coffee house than a public library (by at least an order of magnitude). The day before I wrote the first draft of this piece, there was a child running around on the furniture on the third floor of the library. There is a children's section on the first floor. It's nice and spacious, and where energetic children belong . . . Then some old ladies came into the section I was sitting, speaking very loudly. I find the young and old to be the biggest problems at a library, but of course the mentally ill have their part to play in driving me away. I wish I had brought headphones, and will try to in the future, but there is a joy in packing minimally as well as a joy in being in the scene of a place aurally as well as visually.
Therefore, I vow that the true meaning of my inheritance is that I can pay for an overpriced coffee any day I want to rent a space. I do this rental of space via beverage purchase in order to write and think. I don't read at a coffee house unless I am on a long session and need a break. Instead, I am stacking low-grade social connection with a creative state. Caffeine doesn't hurt, but I find it overrated to the point that I allow myself the heretical thought that one day I might exclusively order mint teas. Time will tell if I can get there, but either way, coffee houses are how I control my environment to live my best life. I think it it is an absurd luxury, but one well-suited for an absurd universe. Also, holding in it in my mind as a luxury and not as an entitlement helps me to appreciate it more. And when there are fruits of my creative work, I do try to share.
