an ode to coffee and my girls

April 25, 2006

I have a deep appreciation for people who love coffee as much as I do.

I have an even deeper appreciation for the girls that introduced me to my loving of coffee. It's true. Before moving here, I had coffee perhaps once a week. Maybe twice if I was feeling in the mood. It was reserved for days that I would, for one reason or another, deem worthy of a cup of steaming hot goodness. After moving to the 'other side' of the mountains, however, and becoming assimilated into their culture, I have come to find something very important. The most seasoned of my memories with 'my girls' over here; the memories with the most passion and spirit and adventure; the ones that carried the best conversations and the heaviest debates; the ones that helped us along the journey to making decisions that will shape the rest of our lives... they all happened over coffee.

I'm not assuming that coffee has magical properties, or that coffee is the maker of all things good, or that life without coffee is an empty existance. Just simply stating that when people from 'out of the area' (you know, those people that carry umbrellas... we call them tourists) think of us as being addicted to the coffee, or the caffeine, or the mochas that they deem as overpriced, that they are misunderstanding the entire concept of why we do what we do.

It's about people. It's about community. It's about relationships. It's about feeling a part of the world that is so much bigger than just yourself and who you are with (if anyone). It's about an idea: that people can gather together for the purpose of good conversation, or reading a good book, or just enjoying a nonfat black and white mocha with no whip, and know that thousands of miles away, at a Starbucks somewhere in Philly, Madrid, London, and Zurich (yes I've been to all of them, so I know they exist), someone else is doing the same thing. Coffee is just a wonderful added bonus. Yes, the topic of conversation varies. Yes, the prices vary from dollars, to pounds, to franks, to euros and back to dollars again. But somewhere in the world, as you read these words, someone is seeking familiarity and comfort in a cup of coffee. It would be silly to say that all my memories are measured tall, grande, or venti... but a good portion of them are.

And that leads me back to the beginning. My girls.

There is something beautiful about being able to call up Bri and meet her once again at the Starbuck on Rose Hill, even if all we will do is laugh about good memories and sigh about when Brittany is coming home and how much we wish Shani was there too. Even if no life changing decisions are made, and no new favorite memories are created, it is the beauty and grace of something so simple as knowing you have gone through think and thin with someone, and still meet them for coffee.

We're getting older, and making decisions, and getting our apartments for the first time, and getting ready for the great reunion of all of us girls again for the few precious months this summer. We will laugh, and we will lay in the sun together, and we will drink coffee together in Kirkland again. I have no doubt that before it's started, it will be over again, and we will be sorry to see another summer come and go so quickly. But I also have no doubt that come the holidays, and come the following summers, we will still carry on.

We are intrepid. We are timeless. Our friendship runs deeper than geographical separation and time between our visits. That's the beauty of true friendship. We represent everything... art, music, athletics, writing, conservatives, liberals, blondes, brunettes, introverts, extroverts, and beauty of every kind and color and fashion. We think alike. And we think differently. It has been proved that no matter how long it's been, we can always pick up where we left off. That is what's beautiful about who we all are, individually and as a whole. At the end of the day, whether I am singing to people someplace random in Europe, or sitting back in my living room in Duvall, I know that there five girls out there that know what they believe, why they believe in it, and are intensely passionate about living life, and living it well.

I will always love them. And I will always love the thing that brought us together the most often... coffee.

"Let the world change you, and you can change the world." -Ernesto "Che" Guevara