Tag: thanks

Coffee Log, Day 332

garethlivesayLeave a comment

Hi.

Coffee: Locomotive Blend, PennyCup Coffee; This blend was sent to me generously by a friend in Asheville. Because of that, I’m going to spend this post talking about it. A coffee log that’s actually about coffee. I know – I’m just as surprised as you are.

The last time I was in Asheville, I was at an Escape Room that A runs. It was my first time doing anything like that and it was a fun experience. Collectively getting lost in a daytime fantasy by locking yourself up. There’s maybe some deeper metaphors about human nature in that.

So anyway, I’m not that up on Asheville – this was a couple years ago – and PennyCup is new to me. Boy, was it a pleasant surprise.

I’m used to drinking mass-packaged store roasts. I spend a little more for fair trade, and a tiny bit on quality, and I’m mostly satisfied with that, but drinking the Locomotive was like having a homemade meal after a year at sea. It had a couple decks to it’s flavor. The first thing you get is this strong tang – something of a lighter roast quality – but after that all the flavors are pulling out stops to richly seduce you, which totally caught me off guard. Lighter roasts don’t usually have that depth.

Halfway through the first cup I was tasting chocolate. Then it was something closer to barley. I was reading Murakami. Then I was working on my novel. The coffee kept up with my changing moods.

I remember this time A and I walked to an old, abandoned house in the woods. There were beer cans in overturned tires and ravens making nests in the rafters. Someone had been living there – you could see matches and bedstuffs – and I was terrified. I kept up with her as best I could, but we turned around before exploring too far inside. I was embarrassed. A could have kept going, I felt like a coward. When I told her all that she said it was okay, made me feel fine for having that limit.

The Locomotive blend was much like that: taking you by the hand to unexpected places, dropping you off somewhere comfortable along the way.

Novel Count: 15,954

Currently Reading: Killing Commendatore, Haruki Murakami

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Coffee is a way of stealing time that should by rights belong to your older self.

Terry Pratchett


Coffee Log, Day 307

garethlivesay2 Comments

Hi.

Coffee: Folger’s Breakfast Blend, Brewed by my Father; My Dad drinks coffee like it’s been prescribed to him; he brews it weak, two scoops for a 12 cup pot; I must have had five full glasses of the stuff; by pot two, he made it stronger, just for me; there’s no coffee that’s as good as the coffee your father makes.

My parents have this dog that’s shaped like a sausage that my mother wraps presents for every year. We toss them down the hall and she goes running. In half an hour, the house is littered with wrapping paper.

That’s Christmas to me: something full of energy that you expect to follow a toss.

Merry Christmas. Or Merry Winter. Whether it’s with friends, family, or at home alone with a good book, I hope you got to have fun unwrapping your plans for the day. Maybe you even surprised yourself a little. And if it’s messy – if there’s paper everywhere, or if the day tore you up in it’s teeth despite the safe veneer we all expect of the holidays – then don’t worry about picking it up right now. Catch your breath. Do whatever you have to to take care of yourself.

Not every person or every family can find joy. The world’s not fair. But everyone can look inside themselves and see something worth opening. Every time you take a breath you’re proving something valuable. And I’m glad I live in a world full of so many curious persons full of curious things.

Thank you. Happy holidays.

Novel Count: 5,924

Currently Reading: Nothing! Will pick a new book after the holidays.

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One of the most glorious messes in the world is the mess created in the living room on Christmas day. Don’t clean it up too quickly.

Andy Rooney

Coffee Log, Day 183

garethlivesay1 Comment

Hi.

Coffee: Americano from Crema Cafe, Cary, NC; I drank it by the cafe window; the roast was bright for an espresso; girls and boys happened by, old women talked about their grandsons’ first days at school; the environment overpowered the taste.

For the first time in a season, I took a walk around the neighborhood. Farther than the apartments, I crossed the dead Thursday afternoon, cut through beating sun, and found shade on a Cary trail. It was calm. It was good. It brought back memories of talking on the phone to him or her, walking this way last year when I was still a bookstore worker with lots of weekdays off. Dandruff autumn, coming back around to you.

I’ve been doing this blog for six months now, only missed one day. To those of you who’ve read one, two, however many posts: thanks. I’ve grown a lot. Maybe you have too. I started this thing on a whim, no real goal, and I still don’t have a goal, but the whim feels a bit firmer, bread rising.

Here’s something I believe: the everyday is magic. A boring, stinky, uneventful magic, but magic all the same. I finished reading LaRose. It paints real characters in larger-than-life situations. I liked it a lot in the end, but it’s pretty contrary to my vision for the world and my work in it. I think real life is made up of larger-than-life people stuck in toothpaste tubes, two-piece suits, pin-stripe dresses; the gooey caramel core of the mundane. I hope my Coffee Log catches a bit of that – licks the stiff surface, dalliances toward the weird magic inside.

There was a fuzzy bug on the trail. It walked sporadically, caught on concrete. In the bleeding sun, the bug looked melted, wispy, a ghost. I realized it must be the Guardian God of every old phonecall I’d taken on the path. Heartbreaks that crunched like new winter ice, thawed now. I almost touched him. The bug saw me coming and shimmied to a patch of shade. Out of the light, it was just a caterpillar.

Currently Reading: LaRose, Louise Erdrich; FINISHED!! Will have a review soon

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“But nowadays I really miss my fucking idols, so that’s the title.” – Trippie Redd, Missing My Idols

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Coffee Log, Day 100

garethlivesay1 Comment

Hi.

Coffee: Cafe Pajaro Extra Dark Roast, Trader Joe’s brand

I was in a hard place when I started this blog. My work of three years had laid me off. My third attempt at getting into an MFA program had fizzled. Ideas walked my arms like ant-lines but none of them were getting on the page. I was in love.

I’d been meaning to blog for a long time. I’d known that consistency and diligence are like salt and pepper to good work and my writing needed seasoning. Hell, my life was pretty bland at that. There’s a fear, though, in putting yourself out: what if no-one reads? What happens when your blood comes out and there’s no-one there to catch it?

Well, you all caught my blood. I hope you know I’ve caught some of yours. The biggest surprise since February has been all the words I’ve discovered from you. I’ve visited sites by Swedish poets, Filipino fashionistas, American pastors. You’ve taught me good business and good writing. Some of you have tipped me off to good places to eat. And I’ve seen so much coffee I could stay awake only off the fumes.

So here’s to 100, and here’s to 100 more. We’re all in this together. Thanks for helping me feel that. Hope I return the favor.

Thanks.

Currently Reading:
Americanah, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

The Way of Kings, Brandon Sanderson

“I like people the enjoy life, cause I do the same.” – Lil Wayne

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