the constant

The cafe. Counting the years seems astounding. It has become the plateau that my life has stretched from. Lovers, Jobs, friends, my stories; essentially my whole current life has evolved from my stint at the cafe.

When I started working there, I was twenty. It was memorial day weekend. I didn't think I would get the job because when I applied, I realized with horror that green painted nails might be scary. Vinny told me they were hiring. His friend worked across the street. She liked me from first glance, my boss, and I was the first person she hired.

That place has run the gamut from home to jail and evoked every emotion of the human condition: anger, frustration, love, awe, sadness and joy; all in varying nuances.

I have changed a lot since I started working there. Of course, much of that change was just that I grew up. Part of the growing up happened when I left the first time to begin working at Starbucks (which is a brief yet horrific chapter in my life) and realized that the things I hated so much were so insignificant compared to the "real world" of working where I was written up (on a permanent record kinda thing) for being three (that's right 1-2-3, just three!) minutes late to work, where the chain of command dictated I tuck in my shirt, and the strange odd world of in your face co-workers became a frightening prospect.

Coming back to the cafe was like going back to my grade school when I was a high school freshman. Everything was slathered in the dewy glow of nostalgia and it all seemed shrunken somehow, like I had become a giant and everything was smaller suddenly.

Part of coming back was temporary (what was supposed to be a month ended up being nearly a year and a half) but the truth is, when I began working there again, it was because everything else around me was crumbling and I think I sensed that and sought out that familiar place. I was graduating college--a huge accomplishment that took up a lot of my energy--and at the same time my relationship reached a boiling point and my home life ceased to exist, it was the one thing I could depend on, the one place I could go and feel at home. Think of it this way, I've lived in ten apartments since I began working there and only two of them really felt like home (you know, you can walk around naked and not feel weird).

Next Wednesday morning will be my final shift at the coffee shop. Part of me wonders if I came back just to have that last day I didn't get when I left for Starbucks because Kim just got upset and let me go when I gave her my last two weeks.

One thing that the cafe has taught me is that you can't be too extreme in this world, because the second you rail against something, a real person shows up to counter your beliefs. I have seen the good, the bad and the ugly, along with the crazy and it was a good ride.