New Writing: Kindness 101 In A Cafe
I write about a basic test of my kindness reserves, which I hope I pass.
On Monday mornings, I start the week with a Kindness 101 Challenge. I take up this challenge at a café by the sea. I know how lucky I am to be able to go to a café by the sea on a Monday morning – you can do that when you're a freelance.
I meet my friend and her mother for a coffee at this café, and the challenge involves the purchasing the coffee.
A simple challenge, you might think. The least I might do, in the circumstances. ut to me, it's a high wire act.
Photo Description: Four women are drinking coffee at a high table with coffee cups in front of them. They are smiling nad sitting close together, which tells you they're friends.
I have to complete four tasks: Locate Friend and Mother, Queue for Coffee, Purchase and Carry Coffee, Find Seat. I have to perform these tasks in quick succession, which I find a total headfry. But I tell myself it's good for my moral fibre
Certain trip wires make these tasks more complicated. Limited ground floor seating in the café. Limited parking around the café. The fact that one of the parties uses a stick. And mobile phones that go dead or missing.
Queuing and Location
The first task is Queuing for a Coffee. The queue is long and moves at a leisurely pace. This is the first test of my flabby emotional sphincter muscle. As a writer, I should be enjoying the warm atmosphere and lively chat. But I'm really thinking, for feck's sake, hurry up.
To pass the time, I complete the second task, Find and Locate Friend and Mother. This involves a lot of phone tag. I play phone tag with my friend, who in turn plays phone tag with her mother.
Phones are fished from the depths of handbags and we eventually make landfall.
Purchase Coffee and Find Seat
When I reach the counter, I begin the third task. Purchase and Carry Coffee. This involves a gauntlet of questions I can't always answer. One or two shots in the latte? Butter and jam with your scones? Chocolate on the cappuccino?
Sometimes my friend materialises to help; other times, she's on a mission of her own: Locate and Fetch Mother. When that happens, the young, kind-hearted staff in the café help me carry the cups as I complete my final task: Find and Locate Seat.
This is the most difficult task – to snag one of the few ground floor seats, which have to be high stools. But when the stick wielder appears, the stools often become magically available, as Lycra-clad patrons slide off the stools and hand them to us.
The Final Reward
Finally, around twenty minutes after I first begin to queue, we are seated. The chat flows. I soak up the rich fund of stories that my friend's mother generously shares. I drink in the warm brew of banter, stories and laughter.
My emotional sphincter muscle relaxes and I feel warm inside. I flatter myself that I have passed my Kindness 101 test, and now I'm enjoying the rewards.
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