The Mighty Viking

A friend of mine’s brief description of her morning reminded me of things I love about Autumn, and inspired the following.  It’s still early in the season, but never too early to write about coffee!

The cold grey gloom of the dawn sky matched perfectly with the tarmac and smooth steel beams reflecting in the tungsten lights, to create a cloud of gloom over a small group of people huddled around the airport coffee shop. They stood, mindless, still dazed by the bustle of the early morning security gate check, vaguely hoping to collect themselves with a cup of something warm. The gigantic windows opening to the twin terminal wings presumed to give patrons something to look at. On this morning, grey planes on a dark grey tarmac with a weeping grey sky backdrop was more than any human wanted to endure.

She arrived on this gloomy scene with the stoic anticipation of a traveler embarking to tropical places. The anticipation that had fueled her excitement for a week now slowed, like a semi toiling over a final grade before the descent into the big city. She was fleeing the gloom, but it stood there, in her path, weaving it’s coils around her mind. Her last thought as she stepped up to the entirely-too-perky-for-this-morning-can-I-get-something-started-for-you-does-it-show-that-I’ve-already-had-six-cups-of-my-own-brewed-to-perfection-coffee Barista was that surely they must have something to help. Her foggy mind deflected most of the Barista’s assault, but she realized she could now read the menu. Or at least one line of the menu. Pumpkin Spice Latte. That would do.

The bustle behind the counter swirled, in stark contrast to the rest of the coffee lounge. Wide padded benches under a fifty-foot ceiling invited people to take in the airport experience in three-dimensional grandeur, to forget about the world and become part of it all at the same time. People sat, lost in their paper, in slow conversation, in gripping determination to make it out of there. Others, who were further into their morning coffee rituals, talked in small pockets of conversation, becoming aware and then trying to distract themselves from the growing dreariness outside. She found a seat open between two of these groups, conversation on one side, sullen silence on the other, and dropped down just long enough to unload her bags, and to hear her number from behind the counter. The dissonance between the sudden relief of unloading and having to get right back up again made her forget herself. She left her bags momentarily unattended, realizing this with a pang of angst as she reached out to the counter for her coffee. The sudden fear of non-compliance disrupted her so badly she nearly abandoned her reach to rush back to her bags, and fought down the panic by focusing on the warmth of the cup. She sat back in her seat again, sighing with relief that no one called security, and tucked her purse and travel bag close against her left hip, nesting them between herself and the end of the bench. She checked the time, mentally gauged just how relaxed she had time to get, and then settled in to her coffee and surroundings. Her awareness of the gloom outside returned.

Her internal commentary slowly turned to the irony of traveling to the tropics on a cold autumn day like this, and she inhaled deeply of the aroma curling from the cup. She found herself transported through a magic portal, suddenly thinking about the things yet undone for winter – the next leaf-raking, the turning of her garden, and draining her garden hose and packing it into its winter place in the garage. Another sip of her coffee enveloped her mind, flavoring her thoughts with notions of how things should be in this season. She thought about November, and how things would be when she returned. Slush on the night streets, lights glaring off the wet pavement. She thought about the blanket of leaves that would lay overher small yard, covering it up to its chin for its winter’s sleep. The bustle of costumed children trampling up to her door on Halloween echoed in the back of her mind. Her cat’s warmth as she sat in the evening reading, and being with this companion, while the winds of November howled in vain outside. Her favorite chair and side-table, with books she liked, called to her from through that portal. She found herself hoping she wouldn’t miss it.

She inhaled deeply of the thick spice steam that lingered in the cup after the last was gone. The grey of the morning brightened from its predawn gloom , she could begin to see the pattern of the rain outside on the tarmac. And with the smell of autumn still swirling around her head, almost…almost she turned back to the exit, to hail a cab, and to go check on the sleeping bulbs in her garden.