THE BARISTA
A coffee bar. Around 3pm.
The place is hard to find, in a backyard of some shops and really small – other then one barista the tiny place can maybe fit another two and a half costumers. It’s empty now.
I am greeted with a big smile and a „How are ya today?“ – „Not too bad“, i reply „How about you?“
„Just living the dream.“ The barista says in a super casual tone. I look at him – and there is that pause. I am waiting for it to end, so we can laugh about his joke. You know how you say something really ludicrous and then we all crack up after that little pause of „haha, crazy stuff, we all KNOW this was a joke. Good one!“.
Instead there is still this irritating silence in which he awaits my order; for i sure did not hear his following sentence „What can i do for you?“ – only now that i am waiting for this situation to resolve am i winding back our talk in time and space and hear it. But hell no – i am still waiting for the moment where we laugh about that ridiculous nonsense, right? That super casual Living-the-dream-blabla…
While i am ordering my coffee, my mind goes: Living the dream! Full stop!
Excuse me: Noooo – How dare you?!
The DREAM: in this tiny backyard coffee bar – nonononono – the DREAM is supposed to be big, sky-high in fact and most importantly un-fucking-reachable! So we can all run after it and chase it down…all we want – you know… run and chase and sweat and run some more and never get there… What is so hard to understand? It is called LIFE, you know?!!
Haven’t we all agreed on that?!
How dare you?? Putting the barre low, like actually walking right over it and getting where you wanted to be and ease into just being there and keeping it real.
What am I gonna do now?
You are disgracing my batches of honor that stand for burning out, stressing out and freaking out. You are making my exhaustion and my deep desolation look weird, funny, stupid and worst of all: unnecessary, in vain – like a joke! Believe me, it wasn’t and isn’t!
You don’t know what i have been through. That pressure is real. And you should be dealing with it too, cause that’s what we do – on this planet!
What if everyone just grabbed their dreams and lived them – Geez!
No more addiction and praise and glorification of ‚busy‘.
Less despair, burn-out, depression and pain.
And all these people living their reality-based, bite-sized journey day by day. Stepping out of insanity, fear and chaos. Finding their own rhythm and their worth and the trust in each other. And easing into that life of authenticity, truth and play.
His voice breaks through my thoughts and dissolves that vision:
„There you go, love – your coffee“ he says. „Have a nice day.“
‚Really?!! Hippie, dreamer, goofball, douchebag, freak‘ – just some of my thoughts… i take a deep breath and only mumble something like:
„You too, keep living the dream„ and almost voiceless „…i’m just gonna go and try to forget about all of this…“ and nonvocal i add „and move on with my insane unwinnable dream-chaser life. So there! Take that, Unicorn!!“.
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