Sir Talks A Lot

        The other day I decided to take some much-needed me-time. I.e., I nixed the pants, threw on some more favorable leggings, a sweatshirt that was two sizes too big and I moseyed my way over to the nearest coffee shop. I sat in the corner next to the cozy brick wall and began to people watch —err study my history textbook. Almost immediately I noticed a tall, thin man with a barely-there mustache and black hair in a short ponytail sitting low at the nape of his neck. At first, I couldn’t really make out what appeared to be a heated discussion with the barista. The curiosity was killing me, as was my need for a hot mocha.

“And that’s the problem I have with religion…all this division of power.” I smiled to myself at the snippet I caught on the way back to my seat after ordering. The all too fabulous barista behind the counter was in for a pretty long night. I slowly closed my textbook and began to observe. There was no way 17^th century Atlantic slave trade would be more entertaining than this.

I heard the barista ask, “What do you do?” A simple question. Probably something she’s asked a lot of people who are not of the grab-n-go variety.

 “What do I do? Hm. That’s a good question. What do I do. Do we ever really know?” He then proceeded to give a long-winded explanation of what I assume to be his philosophy about life and ambition. The more he explained, the less she listened. 

I then looked around the room and noticed that besides a seated middle-aged man with over sized headphones, I was the only other person in there. That’s when I got to thinking. Sir Talks A Lot had a mere audience of one: himself. It was pretty obvious. No eye contact, no responses, no attention. I asked myself, how many people out there in the world, speak to simply hear themselves talk? To hear the sound of their voices? Is he arrogant? Is he pretentious? Or perhaps, he, like many of us, is simply trying to organize his own thoughts. Some do so through art, some through writing (ahem), and maybe others through conversation…even if that conversation is between him and himself. Maybe he was lonely. Maybe no one had time to listen to him when he was younger, so he figured he’d dump all of his ideas onto someone who had nothing else to listen to but the sound of an old-fashioned espresso machine.

             

After he had finally caught on that the café was closing for the night, he saluted the barista and was on his way. The barista turned to me, gave a dramatic sigh and confessed, “I thought he’d NEVER leave…I’ve never seen him here before, but every night there’s always someone…”

I’m still not sure if he should be pitied for being lonely, judged for being pretentious, or admired for speaking up when so many of us would rather stay quiet. Maybe someone should just write about him and call it a day.

            I cracked a comforting smile, trying to sympathize with her. I told her I admired her for keeping her cool when she was really brewing a nice hot pot of dark roast with room for annoyance. I thanked her for my coffee, packed up my bags and told her I’d blog about it.

Girl, this one’s for you.

Xoxo

Ale