People At A Coffee Shop

People At A Coffee ShopThere was something a little ‘off’ about the pair planted in the window of the coffee shop that Sunday morning.There they were reading a newspaper, a newspaper in print mind you.

There are few souls here in the coffee shop who still cling to the news-in-print habit. For some, savoring obituaries in newsprint can be hard to give up.

When you walk the few blocks to get here, you’ll see only a single Wall Street Journal pitched on the lawn.

It’s doubtful Kristen and David will ever circle classified ads and copy phone numbers to find an apartment, or stockpile old papers to line the bottom of drawers or re-pot house plants.

They know the news in print is a day out of date – they consult their phones frequently to stay informed. But sharing a printed paper on Sunday mornings has become a personal ritual dear to them.

David stops at the newsstand (there’s still one on the next corner) to pick up the morning edition. It’s half the size it was when he was a kid. They divvy up the paper and share comments from respective sections.

It’s not just their news consumption that was ironic about them. The way they were dressed that particular Sunday morning was out-of-sync with their demographics. (And, no, they weren’t on the way to church services.)

David wore a conservative sports jacket with a laundered, button-down shirt and jeans; much like his father might have worn while dating his mother.

Kristen wore an elegant, black sweater with a flowing, pleated ochre skirt over knee-height leather boots. Jackie Bouvier comes to mind.

They shop at thrift stores, they said, proving once again that “any old thing” looks fashionable on beautiful, young people. For a brief moment of time, through osmosis, we all felt a little more glamorous than usual.

People At A Coffee Shop

Working up a sweat on opposite sides of the street.

Temperatures weren’t a problem when the workers reported to the construction site outside the windows of our coffee shop. But the air took on moisture and reached hazardous heat levels when the cyclists arrived hours later.

Saturday morning meant something different to the two groups.

For the union crew it meant overtime pay, which would climb even higher if they worked through the solstice’s extra daylight hours. For the cyclists, mostly professionals, Saturday morning offered a few hours when they weren’t expected to be logged to the system.


Their reasons for being out in the heat were different as well. The workers were there strictly for a paycheck. The cyclists were in pursuit of fitness, athletic engagement and the company of friends.

The riders came together through a “clubhouse” sponsored by a chain of cycling-accessories stores, where it’s easy to pay $300 for cleated cycling shoes and where things are covered with logos. Their bikes, one cyclist explained, sell from anywhere between $2000 to $10,000.

The construction workers by contrast could get by investing as little as $200 on summer work clothes (steel-toed shoes included).

It’s not unusual for some cycling groups to break out into a sprint at predetermined points during a thirty mile (2-3 hour) ride, pushing themselves to challenge their personal best. The workers, on the other hand, are trained to pace themselves during long work days to avoid accidents caused by fatigue and repetition.


What the groups on the respective sides of the street had in common that sweltering morning was the search for shade, a hit of caffeine and some kind of sugar fix. But as luck would have it, there weren’t a lot of first-choice pastries left on the trays by the time they all got there.

If you’re looking for an argument, grab yourself a cup of coffee and pull up a chair.

You’ll find yourself in a rag-tag debating society where arguments are floated on topics ranging from trivial to existential.

At any given table and at any spot in the windows of the coffee shop, clusters of people are exchanging opinions.

Irrefutable facts and hard data are duly respected here, of course, but a quick wit wins the day as often as not. There’s a contingent of leg-pullers, hoodwinkers and bomb throwers who keep things from getting tedious.

A guy named Paul (seated center, blue shirt) enjoys a slight advantage given that he’s dedicated years of his life to arguing criminal and civil points of law.

When a lawyer says he was ‘argumentative’ as a child, it’s probably safe to assume he was a manifest pain in the the ass – which happens to be exactly what you want from the court-appointed attorney defending your rights.

Paul’s career included investigating how police departments, prosecutors and judges met, or failed to meet, their constitutional obligations in dealing with defendants.

He litigated employee abuse, domestic violence and suits on behalf of terminally-ill disabled clients. He won receiverships against landlords who cut off heat to drive renters out of their apartments.

At a time when legislators and insurance companies were openly antagonistic toward HIV patients, Paul Rathburn was recruited by the Legal Aid Chicago’s HIV/AIDS Law Project. It took on a personal meaning when he lost his sister to AIDS in 1998

It’s a welcome change, Paul says, that the directions of peoples’ lives don’t hang on the freewheeling debates he enjoys sharing with his buddies these days.

For the modest price of a cup of coffee (decaf served until 11 a.m.) there’s a seat at the table for all comers, but don’t expect to get the last word.

At our humble coffee shop, there is no such thing as a last word.