1 The First Conversation

A Conversation on the Distractions and Intent Concerning Electronics

or

That Time When the Power Died

One small cup of coffee: Black and Hot. A plain bagel. Cream cheese? No, no. Not today.

10:30 flashes on the wall behind the counter. There is an overcast outside.

"Is it a.m or p.m?" asks the monsieur with the grandiose cane and whose protruding hip bone snaps in and out of place with each step. He leers with a slanted smile and a misunderstood twitchy left eye.

He is wearing the latest fashion; rags of cloth caked with dirt, and a doily atop of his head. He settles himself at a newly refurbished table and takes the doily and sets it down. He places a cold cup of coffee on his recycled place mat (the coffee the lady with the baby left behind).

A shout distracts me,

"Excuse me!"

What? Who would know me here? We're just strangers to each other (customers at best) in a plastic house, with plastic chairs, and rubber door knobs.

It is so 'eco-centric'.

The solar panels that are glued atop this hub are connected to a generator, which is thus connected to the toaster, and by extension the sun. . . right? Sun kissed bread, moon grated cheese, and-

"EXCUSE ME!" ( And it could not be helped that that person (male or female) was crazed enough not to ask in supplication, for I would have responded in kind. . .)

-acid infused water bottles that fall from the sky.

All eyes are on me; shock, awe, horror?

"One small coffee: Black and Hot. A plain bagel."

The person behind the counter announces and then gently pushes the product towards me.

Sun kissed?

"Toasted."

Toasted so much it burnt all the way through expectations of plastic homes and cardboard amenities.

Soft moans emanate from the small device, held in between three boys that took a detour from the weekly scheduled field trips made by the public middle school down the street. No one's ever seen it, we just all assume it's the school that the others in this shop went to. The moans grow in volume, as I take my seat at the back of the store. I go straight to the table that I always sit at when I frequent this establishment. The very same one that I carved my name into, like I did with all my past lovers on the bark of decaying trees that were eaten alive by the giant red fire ants of the schoolyard.

One kiss,

Two kiss,

Red lips,

Blue. . . FUCK!

And I just always ended up groping inflamed hands and swollen fingertips, while the other kids laughed on.

We've all got our spot where we feel familiar and lost. Though I do insist we are still strangers, because I can't even tell you if we're friends. The monsieur has yet to approve my request! But neither has my mother. (So moot point. . .) And I am always returning back to the shadows of the coffee shop, or is this a café? ¿A panadería? A portal between night and day where solitary women and men hide in the corners, shunning reality? Beam me up, Scotty! Then let me down easy.

I allow myself to take a sip of the coffee and feel the bitter taste flush through my mouth and through my bloodstream where an easy rhythm emerges:

Sip, swift through my belongings, sip, check devices, sip, battery low, sip, battery low, sip, dead.

And I can hear my mom's words as she suckleded on her marlboro reds in between taking sips of her own bitter coffee as we sat around her kitchen table;

"You're like me, you know? You can never break a habit, you just start another one. One after another, 'til you're confusing your days and blowing the landlord to pay the rent. (Which she did.) But that's your daddy's fault. (This statement was repeated with varying degrees of hatred and lust, and confused me for many years. Until my mother finally confided in me that my father, whom I had yet to meet, was in fact the landlord of the apartment complex that I grew up in.) Now pour me some more coffee, and no more fucking checking those god damn little. . . little. . . windows?"

My mom has an incredible ability to make her presence known within my deepest thoughts, and it's the most pathetic moment, yet the most empowering when I realize she was right only by discovering that I was wrong.

But epiphanies are wasted in the coffee shop. They go straight down the toilet. A line wraps around the building at the beginning of every hour on the hour. But I am trying to hold onto this trajectory of thought that has been encompassing my mind all morning long. The moans are being overthrown by the giggles of the school children. The person behind the counter is yelling at the next customer, mom's voice rattles in my head and confuses me. Just like the clock that doesn't tell you if it's dark or not, because nobody looks up! LOOK UP!

"It only works if you say 'Simon Says'", one of the school kids calls out to me, as I realize that I have just yelled those words aloud.

And it is times like these when the power dies on our small devices that the world comes to an end. I suddenly remember that the clock hasn't worked for years. The boys take turns going to the bathroom to jerk off and that's why there is a line. And my mom's been sitting in front of me this whole time, bitching about my landlord daddy and sucking on e-cigarettes rather than her marlboro's. Because she's "classy" and the staff members can't kick her out if it's "not the real thing".

Well then what is the real thing you ask? (You probably didn't.) It's moments like this where we peer through tiny windows of text, typing volumes of threats, while sharing videos of the decrepit. It is ignoring the people that yell about coffee and carve slander and words of possession onto the furniture. It is stealing old, cold cups of rancid beverages. It is coughing each time your mom so much as breathes your way. And will someone fix that god damn clock before it-

"Would you like some water?", the person behind the counter suddenly appears at my table. "Yes, thank you. . . Are there any outlets available?"