Vol. 8 - Terrible Love and Shannon and the Clams
I'm back on Substack and feeling emotional about coffee.
It’s Tuesday, so it’s my day off. This is a declaration of boundaries from my boss (me) to my employee (also me).
[It’s been a while since I’ve posted on this Substack, so let me catch you up real quick: In October 2023, I left my full-time job to become a freelance barista trainer. I branded my mobile coffee training service as “Barista Friend.” I teach coffee classes, private lessons, and corporate team building. That’s what I’m currently doing for work. I am riddled with self-doubt and having a *mostly* good time. Okay, now back to the story.]
On the second day of the traditional work week, I am supposed to wake up whenever I want to. I am supposed to spend the day in creative mode, writing or making music, and definitely not thinking about or making coffee.
But this morning, against orders, I woke up at 7 a.m. and checked my emails.
There’s a lot going on right now. A lot of people need things from me, and a lot of it is volunteer work. It’s hard to categorize these things, prioritize them, make sense of the hours and energy I’m spending for the good of the community as my bank account steadily dwindles. I hate that I’m complaining about this. It’s all good things, meaningful work. I think I’m just tired.
Once I felt caught up, I made a latte for my partner Jack, still sleeping on the couch and somehow completely undisturbed by the shriek of the grinder.
One good thing about being a home barista is you never have to put on pants if you don’t want to, so I don’t. I poured a lopsided tulip, nothing photo-worthy, then tiptoed to the living room to carefully wake him. We had breakfast together. It was, all things considered, a cute morning.
Jack left for work, and I put a podcast in my headphones and decided to take a long walk to Terrible Love in Hyde Park. A guy named Brian started this project out of a horse trailer in the backyard of a theater about two miles away from my house. He serves a simple menu with Parlor Coffee and the occasional guest roaster.
He takes it seriously, but not too seriously. I haven’t talked with him at length about his philosophy, but I get the vibe that he’s doing this out of love. Love for coffee, but also artistic expression, beauty, community… All the right things, in my book.
The podcast I chose was decidedly not coffee-related, in an effort to save my “day off”; Shannon and the Clams talk to Justin Richmond about their new album, how it sprung in the wake of her fiancé’s death, how Shannon Shaw usually writes songs on bass but this time tried the Omnichord, and how those new sounds transformed her into a loose cannon of creativity, processing raw emotion via drum machines and strummed chords.
And I am jealous, of course. I’m jealous because Shannon Shaw writes music to process emotions, and so do I, usually, but I can’t today because so many people need things from me and I am the coffee girl and apparently an entrepreneur now and GOD, I could go on forever, but why waste the word count? Stay positive! Stay grounded! I came here to say something nice.
I’ve been feeling extraordinarily sensitive as of late. When I walk past construction workers tearing up a sidewalk, I think I can feel the concrete’s pain. The drilling sound makes me queasy, so I walk as fast as I can in Chacos. I notice all the broken tees that litter the path next to Hancock Golf Course. I admire the white brick house with the pale green doors, briefly grieve the idea of owning a home, of decorating my wraparound porch with jasmine trellises and big clay pots of flowers and cherry tomatoes. Not with this job, I won’t, but maybe it’s a mindset thing?
A few blocks from the cafe, a new smell stops me in my tracks. It’s coming from a bush of small yellow flowers with reddish pink stamen and sharp, waxy green leaves. It’s growing over a white picket fence, almost too perfect, and smells soft and sweet. I stop to take a photo with my plant identifier app. Thryallis, Galphimia, gracilis, Golden Shower. Horticulturists often incorrectly apply its name, and it’s native to Brazil, Paraguay, and Bolivia, says the app. I inhale sharply, trying to remember all this, knowing I’ll forget.
When I look up, Terrible Love is a block down the street. I jaywalk toward the brick building, following stone steps leading to picnic tables. I recognize a few customers. They’re baristas from other shops, all sitting together, people I know mostly from the internet, a few conversations here and there, a job title in common.
I like these people, but I just smile but keep my headphones in; I don’t feel like small talk. I haven’t been feeling myself at all, and I hate my outfit. I don’t know why I wore this. I’m sweating, and I’m tired. I wish I were invisible.
To my surprise, it’s not Brian behind the counter but a new face I haven’t seen. They’re kind when I order an espresso. They flip the touch screen around and disappear behind a silver Linea machine. I admire the details: a boiler room-turned-walk-up coffee shop. Fantastic.
The logo is a simple, strong sans-serif typeface, printed everywhere. Terrible, it reads, a little heart at the end. A wooden pastry case protects a small selection from Texas French Bread. There are custom, hand-printed postcards, a rendering of the building stamped in faded blue on thick off-white paper. It all feels clean, new, and intentional. Behind me, honeybees work on a sprawling bush of magenta flowers.
There’s an analog sound system in there, a nice one. A stack of tapes and a record player. As if on cue, Brian weaves through the line and squeezes behind the counter. He looks really happy, I think.
He asks me what I have going on today and I say nothing, just walking around. I tell him about the podcast and I congratulate him on the space. The barista passes me an espresso in a small paper cup, stamped with a pink logo. I give it a swirl and start walking back the way I came.
And here’s where I start crying.
On the first sip, it’s bright and intense. But it’s zigging and zagging all over my tongue, and I can hardly figure out what I’m tasting, so I take another sip. It’s chocolatey now. I can feel some of the grit, a syrupy mouthfeel that’s coating my teeth. Another sip reveals new flavors, unidentifiable, possibly blending with the memory of the Thryallis. I knock the whole thing back on the fourth sip, toss the paper cup into a neighbor’s trash can, and resume the podcast.
But within a few breaths, I am overcome with emotion. It’s the aftertaste. It’s getting better, somehow. The shadow of this espresso is with me, and still, and still, and four blocks later it’s still there, and it’s changing from raspberry jam to cocoa powder and back again.
How can something so small pack so much complexity? How can two ounces of liquid bring me to tears? Is this why I’ve chosen this path? Is it because I love this drink, this magical little weird drink that keeps me focused and alive and awake? Can I ever have a day without coffee for as long as I live?
I let the questions wash over me like sparkling water and post a photo of the cup on Instagram. A friend replies, says they’re headed there after an appointment, asks me what the coffee was.
What was the coffee? I can’t believe I didn’t ask. I wasn’t in the mood to talk about origin, roast, processing. I just wanted to have a coffee like a normal person, not try and analyze it, but I had no idea who to thank for the taste still dancing on my tongue.
There are a million reasons an espresso tastes the way it does; the barista is just one of them. Also, the energy of the space, the shape of the cup, the smell of the neighborhood, the philosophy of the roaster, the discernment of the green buyer, the years and years of dedication and the skill of the producer, the abundance of Mother Earth herself. There were too many hands to shake for this moment of bliss.
An hour later, the friend texted me to say it was Mercado Sin Nombre’s Teotepec Natural, from Mexico. I laughed out loud. It was roasted by my friends! My first Barista Friend consulting client, a new cafe in town that employs some of my favorite, most passionate, talented baristas. Pride is added to the pile of emotions and I text my friend Julian to thank him.
Today, I feel emotional about coffee. I feel conflicted about whether or not I can handle the challenges of being a freelancer, whether I have what it takes to be a business owner, if I want to open a cafe or a coffee school or run a non-profit. Maybe I ought to go back to being a barista, working for someone else, helping them see their vision through. Maybe I’m too young, too inexperienced to be on my own like this. Maybe I’m more of an artist than an entrepreneur. Maybe I’m too sensitive to have so many strong opinions.
But none of that, none of those thoughts, are earthbound. The thing that’s true is this morning, I walked to a coffee shop on my day off, smelled the flowers, and had an espresso that reminded me how good it feels to be alive.