Me and my coffeehouse… it’s a love/hate relationship, for sure. It’s great on the rare occasion that Shelley and I get to go “sit a spell,” sans kids, and just soak it in. It’s great when someone who actually likes coffee — black coffee, and not primarily due to caffeine — comes in and starts up a conversation. It’s great on the days people are feeling generous, or romantic, or joyful generally. There are plenty of reasons to love it.

It’s not so great, however, when I look at how much time I’ve put into it, then consider how little (financially speaking) I have to show for it. It sucks when customer after customer comes in looking for “a regular cup of coffee,” interspersed with yuppies who want to order everything “grande” and “skinny.” And it really, really bothers me that most of my employees still don’t have a true appreciation of coffees — the differences in origins, roast profiles, brewing methods, etc.

That last one, of course, is my own fault. And it pisses me off.

(more…)

There’s something about a rainy day, in a colder-than-the-outdoors office, with no actual work to do, that makes one ponder the finer things. Not “fine china” fine… maybe “finer” isn’t even the right word. But the small things that make life just a little better.

Today, that’s 12 ounces of rich espresso, diluted with a bit of water, touched with a bit of cream and accented by a dash of turbinado sugar (it’s grown in volcanic areas of Hawaii).

There are some days—growing more frequent as my responsibilities continue to multiply—that I wish I didn’t own a business at all. There’s taxes to do, systems to improve, business to build; it’s all so damn tiring. But then I walk in and half the customers say “Hi,” and I grind a few beans and push a couple of buttons.

And there it is. Real, honest-to-God pleasure. The pleasure of the unnecessary. The pleasure of a beverage whose roots I know well (but not well enough), whose journey I can trace on a map with geographical certainty.

And a beverage whose true beauties, if it weren’t for me, might not be known by a few accountants and lawyers and artists and other downtown folk. Most of them, admittedly, don’t notice those beauties. But I’ve opened a few eyes to the lesser-known qualities (and opened countless sleepy eyes by sheer virtue of caffeination).

So here’s to a small Americano. You might think that it’s free, for me. But I’ve paid for it many times over… and at this moment, it’s worth every penny.