I feel out of place, unnerved. I’m drinking coffee in a beautifully appointed coffee shop populated with beautiful people, including the baristas. I haven’t shaved in months, where threadbare clothes, ripped sneakers, and…when was that last shower?<\/p>\n
Everything is perfect here: marble floors, black beams, industrial lighting and exposed silver HVAC, wooden tables. A glass garage door opens to a patio with a fire pit!<\/p>\n
Can you write a novel in a beautiful coffee shop surrounded by beautiful people? Where is the friction? I don’t think I can. I contrast my writing spirit here with Oregon Tavern Age country and the decidedly non-beautiful people who inhabit that landscape.<\/p>\n
Wait, I think I’m getting it all wrong. Bob Seger wrote a beautifully poignant song, almost an anthem, called \u201cBeautiful Losers.\u201d That’s where the novel is for me. That’s where my journalism is. <\/p>\n
A young man walks in wearing a blue suit and blue tie. He doesn’t wear this ensemble well. It hangs all wrong. I can use that.<\/p>\n
A barista looks at me and smiles as I write on my Alphasmart. I think she thinks I’m a transient. Perhaps I am. <\/p>\n
A Down’s Syndrome couple walk in. They appear to be the happiest couple in the world. They are not part of Bob Seger’s world. They need some songs of their own. I used to write songs, but that was a different me. I’m writing Walt Whitman-kind-of-songs now. I need a collaborator to put them to music and sing them for America. <\/p>\n
Time to go. I leave a tip for the barista. That might change her mind about me. <\/p>\n\n
I feel out of place, unnerved. I’m drinking coffee in a beautifully appointed coffee shop populated with beautiful people, including the baristas. I haven’t shaved in months, where threadbare clothes, ripped sneakers, and…when was that last shower? Everything is perfect here: marble floors, black beams, industrial lighting and exposed silver HVAC, wooden tables. A glass […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4505,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[806,652],"class_list":["post-4504","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-meditations","tag-coffee-shop-novel","tag-coffee-shop-writing","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4504","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4504"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4504\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4506,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4504\/revisions\/4506"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4504"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4504"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4504"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}