George Tannenbaum over at Ad Aged has a eloquent post that’s reminded me of the beauty that is early morning creativity. There’s something special about waking up a little bit before the rest of the world (or your time zone), driving to work a little bit before rush hour and sitting down at your desk a little bit before phones start ringing. Every once in a while, an uninterrupted sun will wake you up early on a Sunday morning and you’ll head to the coffee shop on the corner to make pen meet paper.
The following is the unedited product of one such Sunday morning:
A few minutes after the cafe’s radio switches from G&R’s “Live and Let Die” to Orleans’ “Still the One” the man in the corner is still whistling the first eight notes from Slash’s rift. Perched on a stool next to a counter jetting from the wall opposite the cash register, the man is focused. His left arm is bent and wedged between his overweight form and the stool’s backrest. His right arm floats unsupported, heavily hanging from his body and doing all the work. An outstretched index finger taps the video game machine supported from the ground by a single black steel pole. Neither of his generic white sneakers reach the ground and are instead tucked behind the stools bottom cross support, toes pointing at the ground.
Another man, similar in age to video poker guy (VPG), peers through the cafe’s front door, hands on the glass and cupped around his eyes to block out the sun behind him. He yanks open the door and walks in with a gusto no one could have seen coming from a short, aging man sporting a worn flannel work shirt, faded (unintentionally) jeans and brown, beat up steel toes. The hipster girl behind the cash register reorganizing the color-coded cardboard boxes of teas almost purposefully ignores his entrance. Before the door closes behind him, Flannel Man has entered into conversation with VPG, who never diverts his attention from the screen maneuvered to face him.
A few short, unrelated exchanges later, Flannel Man says to VPG, in sudden volume, “Shit, I owe you $10,” and exits with the same urgency with which he came.
By this time the cafe’s radio has again switched songs, but VPG, whose mind, tucked away behind those awful, over-sized, auto-shading glasses common to the elderly, is a million miles away and hasn’t seemed to notice because he continues to whistle the same eight notes over and over.
VPG’s size surely has to be testing the limits of that stool, which couldn’t possibly have been designed to support such a load, at least not for an extended period of time, and certainly not to facilitate video poker addictions, which this must be given it’s 9 am on a Sunday morning in an overwhelmingly Italian neighborhood and there are at least three churches within walking distance, not counting the one across the street whose steeple is casting a shadow on to the cafe’s original hardwood floor and ending directly beneath VPG’s toes.
Without warning the radio begins to emit a bothersome collection of noises, soon recognized to be Haddaway’s “What is Love,” AKA the Night at the Roxbury song. This immediately irritates VPG and he stands mid-game, grabs his cane and portable oxygen bottle, and limps out the front door.
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