As I sit here in a plush armless chair, the fabric a disorderly collections of multi-drab boxes, I soak up the light atmosphere of the coffee shop. Live folk music hangs as a sun lit mist in this little rectangle of a room. The last rays of the day creep in from high set windows as the swanky brown and black streaked ceiling lamps come to electric life. This oddly mixed little place of unique and cliché tends to put one out of ease in the most sublime way; not a place where you can gently fall asleep, nor a place where you can feel anxious anomalies of perception. It is in essence… playfully beautiful.
The small band of patrons that inhabit this place of modern subdued magic chat happily among themselves. The young couple smiles excitedly as they share their collected experiences; a pair slowly intertwining their current existences together. A digital mystic of a man sits quietly in the corner; his ebon bald bust framed artistically by a shortly trimmed snow white beard. He contently performs his clandestine clicking activities upon his lap top companion. The elderly couple, conservatively clad despite unconventional flickering grins, appreciates the joyful beats as they sip from their tall white cups. In the back works a lovely olive purveyor of caffeinated delights. Her clenched towel vigorously cleans away as the men on stage play on.
As night makes its presence fully known, the performers switch the stage with friendly passing greetings. In the seat a large, bright smiled girl nonchalantly sits with an arm resting upon her acoustic guitar. Her long black hair drapes her face as she takes in a deep breath. The velvet of that voice was pulled taunt and relaxed over and over again as she intermingled her song with softly strummed and plucked notes. The glide of the sound doused the silent assembly as she continued to slowly twist that soft velvet into a variety of emotional concepts. Her set of nameless songs complete and a transitioning duet with her lover exhausted, she retakes an admiring seat among the other musical parishioners.
The young hippy, frazzled blond locks and heavy guitar clutching hands, was no master of manipulated melody, but neither was he a novice of notes. His upbeat happy tune brought a certain amount of joy to the smiling crowd as he played for the pure self gratifying pleasure of his own sound. As he began to entice the familiar harmony of my own favorite cover from his stringed accomplice, I found myself mouthing the words in tandem with this innocent youth: ‘How, how I wish you were here…’
My reverie breaks as a ska styled youth, black hat and oversized hanging ear lobes, inquires about the vacant chair placed besides me. With a warm smile I offer the wood and fabric furniture to the boy. Looking at the body filling room and my own extinguished coffee cup, I collect my things and make my way to the door. With a line of sweetness anticipating customers awaiting her attention, the hazel coffee maid takes the time to thank me for my choice of entertainment.
I smiled to myself on the windy walk back to the truck, ‘I think this self assigned quest is complete… The Bandstand might just work.’
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