The Mind Itself

one

My favorite thing about the city will never cease to be the dirty waste-shedding tacky hell-raising irritable crowds that grace the even dirtier streets of THE city, New York City. Call me crazy, but something about strangers packed shoulder to shoulder, like sardines in a can, cell phones and coffee in hand as they rush off to God knows where speaks to me about the unity in diversity, even through the steadfast angry honks of the golden chariot drivers. Sure, I go to coffee shops too, and I have a cell phone. You'd think I fit into this city like a puzzle piece, struggling along and telling myself that if I can just make another hundred this month, it'll all be okay, or that if the tight dress I bought will finally impress the guy next door, everything in my life will come together, but think again. I go to coffee shops, but I don't drink coffee. The stuff smells like sex, or heaven (you can decide which is better), but tastes like it came from the sewer behind my dorm building. Such deception is wretched, and I don't tolerate it. Instead, I sit back with my plain ol' chai latte and listen to the whiney requests of the rest of the city.

"Extra foam," chides the girl who, judging from her blotchy eyes, sweatpants, and slightly too obvious hangover, got dumped last night. If I was the kind of person who could approach another person and say whatever I wanted, I would tell her that it will get better, but who really gives a damn?

"No, you idiot, I said no foam," snaps the suit with the look of utter disdain for the poor girl behind the counter, his contemptuous eyes lingering on what he considered to be a failure of a person as he returned to his phone call. Then all the blood drained from his face as he listened to the other end, nervously smoothing his intentionally greasy hair back with shaky hands as he turned towards the counter and accepted the no-foam caffeine from the timid girl without another glance. I felt for her, and as I gave him a glare that he would never see, I prayed that he was getting fired over that phone, arguably the worst way possible.

I do this every morning; I watch people. One moment in the city is not identical to any other moment, and every day I will see a thousand new people, so how could I ever get bored? It entrances me, the comings and goings of so many unique souls, and I wonder about their stories, their past and present. Someday, I have resolved, when I have discovered the key to unwavering courage, I will approach someone who looks as though they have lived a thousand lives, and I will ask them about just one, just one story that I hope will change mine. Did I mention that I am a writer? I guess that would explain a lot about me, the romantic notions and head in the clouds, but I can't help it when I am surrounded by so much beauty. Personally, I don't need a picturesque mountaintop or a postcard-worthy beach, and while I acknowledge those as beautiful, I think that most striking is the human mind, the human life, the human condition. Luckily, I find myself seated in the middle of the metaphorical crockpot of human life, where the smelly homeless man sitting on the corner of 5th and West 33rd very well could have been the next Brad Pitt if he hadn't started doing crack. My view of the world from the corner table in the coffee shop is where I hope to find the inspiration for some piece of writing that someone will publish, because put plainly, I am 20 years old and sick of being told that I can do everything I want someday. Someday? Screw "someday", what I want is to do everything right now, to be something right now, to mean something to someone in this God-forsaken world right now.

Different kinds of people buy different kinds of coffee. There are regulars that I see every morning, and there are random ones who I see once and never see again. With regard to the second half of that sentence, sometimes I wonder if the randoms aren't actually random, if maybe they come here every day like I do, but I just haven't noticed them. Then I start to feel bad, as if I have hurt their feelings in some way, but I can't help it if I notice the old woman who always wears neon sweaters and looks as though she should not be out and about in such a city. People like that must distract me from people like the exhausted mom with a toddler in tow who orders coffee blacker than the soul of Satan. I feel as though I have done the less-noticeable people like her a great injustice because personally, I want to be noticed more than anything. If I knew that even one regular sat two tables away from me and observed that I order a chai latte every morning and how I wore my hair that day, I would feel so fulfilled and hopeful that someone deemed me worth noticing. In my opinion, I'm kinda plain, with basic brown hair and an average body. No one has ever approached me in the street and asked me what modeling agency I work for, to which I would flip my hair and say with such an aloof air, "Nobody yet," then I would smile as they handed me their illustrious-looking business card and went on their way. And yes, I have planned out that scenario on the off chance of such an ordeal taking place. Basically, I notice people and empathize with them, and I want with all my heart for someone in this coffee shop, someone in this world, to do the same for me.