On Espresso and the Divine

A man walks into his local Starbucks at 5:32am.  The tired young woman behind the bar smiles forcedly and takes his order, firing up the machines to produce their first drink of the day.

“Quad grande, two-pump vanilla, skim, one-hundred-and-eighty-degree soy, light foam caramel macchiato.”  The tired looking barista calls his drink and sets it down heavily on the bar.  He smiles, thanks her, and walks out the door at 5:35.

The man’s name is Roger, and he’s wearing an ironed, dark blue pinstriped suit and a bright, starched white shirt and tie.  He lowers a pair of expensive sunglasses from their perch on his carefully styled hair to his eyes and takes a seat on the hard, metallic furniture exterior to the little coffee shop.  He sets his cup down very gently on the table-top, frowns at the girl’s careless Sharpie smudges on the side of the drink, and materializes a cigarette from the seamless folds of his jacket.  He takes a long drag before carefully extracting a tablet-sized notebook from the briefcase at his side. 

“Anger is a vital life force.  Channeled artistically or nondestructively, it has the power to move worlds.” He writes down each word in meticulous blank ink on a fresh page of the half-full book, tilting the cup backwards to protect the words from the rising sun’s glare.  “Alanis Morissette.  Musician. Her songs can be found on Starbucks Hear Music ™ station, XM Satellite Radio Channel 75.”

Roger sighs and sets the notebook down with the capped pen beside it.  He folds his hands in his lap and begins his daily meditation.  The words today held particular meaning.  He marveled at the concept of anger as a force to be manipulated and driven towards a positive outcome.  After a few moments of close-eyed deliberation, he studiously wrote down a three goals for the upcoming day in relation to today’s The Way I See it (#80). 

Roger always feels refreshed after his morning meditation.  Ceremoniously, he slides the notebook to the other side of the table and gathers his grande cup in two hands.  The first sip of each drink is like the first drop of forgiveness and cleansing on his chaotic life.  He shivers from the sensations jumping across his nerves.  These are the moments that make him feel the most alive. 

Roger will spend the rest of his day in a nice, orderly office on the third floor of a small building on Galilee Street with reflective windows and shiny marble floors in the lobby.  He will arrive at seven-thirty after leaving his home Starbucks at 6:05, feeling invigorated from an inspiring drive filled with the newest Hear Music album.  At eleven o’clock, he will pull a black overcoat over his shoulders and complete the brusque, half a mile walk from his office to his work Starbucks.  He will buy a venti Americano with no room charged to his Starbucks gift-card and return in high spirits.  On brighter days, he will also return with a small packet of Madeleine’s shortbread cookies or Starbucks Original Chocolate Covered Espresso beans. 

His day will pass slowly.  He will answer the phone, hold business meetings and manage his employees with the lifestyle delineated in his notebook of cup-side quotes.  He will live from one cup to the next, rely on the life-giving power of espresso to sanctify his misdeeds and create order in his world.  When he is not actively engaging with others, he will be thoughtfully contemplating his The Way I See It of the day and considering the worldwide coffee industry that functions minute by minute, silently and steadily, in unconditional love and support of his patronage.  He will live his life in respect of the sacrifice made by Starbucks employees everywhere to so selflessly provide him with the means to live an extraordinary life.

His evenings are spent at the store, of course.  Roger’s closest friends are those who understand the Power of the Espresso of Starbucks.  Together, they sit in the Starbucks Comfy Chairs ™ from five o’clock until closing most nights of the week, discussing the intricacies of the latest Black Apron Exclusive coffee.  They’ve worked for several years now to compile literature that will aid them in cross-referenced study of Starbucks publications and coffee descriptions, and each of them steadfastly maintains their personal Coffee Passports.  Sometimes, they will meet for support and a time of sharing to confess their personal espresso failures with home machines or any pious sins they may have perpetrated against the higher standard of the lifestyle and community they’ve chosen and committed themselves to.

Roger is careful never to miss a meeting.  He decorates his small apartment in a tasteful, modern way mirroring the relaxed “Home-Away-From-Home” atmosphere at his local Starbucks.  But the time spent at the store itself is considered highly sacred, he values it above all else and will sacrifice varieties of offered social and indulgent opportunities that would otherwise conflict with his Starbucks life.  He is a righteous follower of the Starbucks doctrine; and the only passion he allows himself is a passionate conviction that his life was nothing before the Power of Espresso sacrificed its natural, botanical life to save his human life from disordered destruction.  He believes in the power of sacrifice and of order, of caffeine and meditation.

This is Roger as he should be.

But Roger often has trouble adhering so strictly to the principles of his faith.

Sometimes, after he has put his first cup out of sight and closed his notebook of meditations, he will allow himself the greatest indulgences.  Sometimes, he will use a proxy server to access pornographic websites on his computer, even though this is clearly immoral according to principles gleaned from the Fiancas de Chiapas bold coffee package, released in autumn of 2004.  Sometimes, he will spill something intentionally and not clean it up.  Sometimes, he will subtly rearrange the numbers in Excel documents submitted to him for editing that will coincidentally benefit his personal company account.

Sometimes, he will even violate the holy triple balance: order an unbalanced drink with one less standard shot or an unconventional mixture and quantity of milk.  Each drink must pay homage to the holy triple balance of espresso, milk, and syrup.  These are the moments that extract the most compunction from his rigidly constructed heart.  Straight espresso or coffee must always be taken black and never decaffeinated, although once last week he ordered half-caf. 

And it is these little sins he could never even dream of confessing to his friends.

The errors they confess to each other and hold each other accountable for are far more acceptable.  For instance, last night he confessed that once last week he used day old espresso left over from the night before to brew his afternoon doppio instead of grinding the beans himself moments before they were to be ingested.  For this, the group of well-dressed, clean young men and women lit a communal cigarette and intoned the classic grind-before-brew mantra and directed him to write a letter of his wrongdoings to the Power of Espresso.

The real errors in his life, however, horrified him.  Every fiber in his body desired the order Espresso was supposed to be providing him with, when every fiber in his body should simply be desiring and worshipping the beauty of Espresso.  He found himself tempted without strength and alone in a group of believers that could not be more tightly knit.  Even within the group itself, he often felt betrayed.  There could be no confidence or privacy, as there should be according to The Way I See It #93.  The one time he bared a true sin to his fellow macchiato devotee, Patricia, the whole group knew about it the next morning.  He had never felt so ashamed in his entire life.

And yet, he could not think of living any other way.  This was the force of his life; the meaning of his identity; the breath of order in a chaotic world.  His failings were grave, but the Espresso was always forgiving.  He had to try harder, surrender more, reflect the sacrifice of each dissolved bean he drank.  He cranked up his Starbucks XM satellite radio station a little louder on his way to work, squeezed his eyes a little tighter during his meditations.

Roger cannot escape from the reality of Starbucks.  One he has internalized it, he will always feel guilty for falling short of its standards – even though the standards are for the most part, impossible.  The key is to understand that the Power of Espresso can transcend impossibility, and that true happiness lies in experiencing the sacrifice that made the failings possible.

An under-caffeinated life is a life without order, and a life without order is certainly not worth living.