Afternoons Over Coffee

Allow me to open this posting by saying that, I have nothing important to say whatsoever at the moment. I'm actually just sitting in a coffee shop, which is awkwardly playing a CD I'm on, enjoying my anonymity. My wife and good friend are at a work meeting, and I'm sitting here, on a rather uncomfortable bench typing this message. There is a girl sitting on a red cushioned chair flipping pages in a magazine on the end of the room , a glamour rag no doubt, and listening to her headphones. Listening to her headphones rather than the CD (the one that I play bass on). She's not paying attention to me, actually she's completely unaware that I'm even here in the room typing about her. She'll never know. Although my wife and I frequent this particular cafe, and my wife even works here. I knew nothing about the girl working behind the counter. She doesn't work here much anymore, trying to get a job at a hospital as some sort of physician's something or other. Just like the girl on the other side of the room, she doesn't know that I'm telling you all about her. She knows my friend who works here, the friend who wrote the songs on the album that I played bass on, the album that is playing right now. It's interesting to me that three people can sit in a room and not even say so much as a word to each other. In fact, we'll all walk away without even paying deference to each other. I wont say anything to end-of-the-room girl at all, not even a casual goodbye. I'll probably smile discretely and wave to behind-the-counter-aspiringphysician'ssomethingorother when I leave. But I wont wonder about her life tomorrow, she'll leave my reality and that's pretty much the end on it. It's odd to sit around and do apparently nothing at all, but underneath the surface of it all is a wild and pulsating life of thought and essence. Although none of us have even talked to each other save for the mild pleasantries of commerce, there lies a myriad blanket of thought and intention weaving around all of us like one gigantic, and growing cobweb. And in the midst of that huge cobweb is the Spirit running frantically down the strands that are dusted with the very truths of God.
It's interesting to me that three people can sit in a room and not even say so much as a word to each other. In fact, we'll all walk away without even paying deference to each other. But what seems to be some sort of exercise in isolation is not that all. The things that connect man to man are not things that can be defined or improved upon. They simply are. We are all connected, all involved in this quiet afternoon over coffee, all playing dramatic, and interlocking roles. Weaving back and forth between each other through observation and thought, interpretation and conclusion. All serving a purpose beyond the tangibles that we can see, my friend's CD is singing truth out, bouncing it off the exposed brick walls and into our ears. Stirring sonic truth down to where it counts. Behind-the-counter-aspiringphysician'ssomethingorother is chatting it up with some guy about getting a different job, end-of-the-room girl is studying diligently across the room. I don't know what the subject is, but after spending that much time on her work I'd say that she should pass, but of course, she'll lose some crucial points on a pointless rote learning question that has no reflection on her study skills. Me? I'm just the photographer. None of these people had any idea that they would be the subject in an essay this afternoon, but I had no idea that I would be writing it either. Life is a lot like a Picasso painting, at first it looks like a bunch of bright scribbled lines, but when you step back it's all one canvas. All one afternoon over coffee.