Life at 3 miles an Hour

First of all, let me just say, “If you could see what I see” outside the window of my caffeine portal. I’m looking out across calm waters reflecting the bitter cold, dawn approaching, radiant blue skies. On the far side the lights of the early morning ferries glow in the foreground while an, out of season, golden moon drops low in the sky, broken only by the outline of the jagged snow covered mountains that seems to swallow it. Within just a few brief minutes, the scene has changed, the mountain snow glows a sunrise red and I’m left with the realization that I could have missed this moment. Like many others who are intent on dealing with the reality of Monday, I frequently get caught up and miss the morning greeting cards that lay out before me each day. I could just as easily miss it. However today I’m a bit more aware of my surroundings. I’ve begun a stretch of vacation. It’s not an ordinary vacation either. First of all, my gorgeous wife and I will spend the next 10 days at ...

The audience is the key. When I write this down, it all seems absurd to me. Growing through the “what I want to be when I grow up” phase of my life, consideration of an audience never even registered with me. Nothing that I was interested in had any type of audience attached. Actually, had I pursued my original path, I would have spent considerable amounts of time completely alone in vast stretches of wilderness, as opposed to the urban jungle which I now find myself a resident of. Fortunately, I have this thing for warm showers and shaving and all, so here I sit, fairly domesticated. The only alone time I can seem to be able to carve out now is in the darkness of the pre-dawn hours that most people tend to avoid. It’s fine with me, I’ve still had my shower. Anyway, back to the audience portion of my life. I now have a distinctly different life from the one I had imagined during my “what I want to be” phase. I have an audience. It kind of comes with the territory when you’...

Oh how the mighty have fallen. As today had already been an exercise in futility, I made a decision to change up my caffeine venue and see where I can dig up a bit of inspiration. Well…. I seem to have found some. I’m back at my favorite haunt of a year ago and my how time changes all things, including atmosphere. Let’s just say that I won’t soon be back. It is such a shame to see it a shell of its former life. A year ago my daughter worked here, a friend managed here, and all was right with the world. Not so much today. It has fallen victim to neglect like so many other great institutions. Maybe it’s a sign of the times. I just read that Howard Shultz is going to be pulled back into actually working for his millions at Starbucks in the hopes that he can somehow, once again, work his magic and entice people to part with five bucks for a fifty cent drink. I don’t think that Starbucks is the victim of neglect though. Probably more like a bit of induced common sense. It’s been...