Pants

I used to fix espresso machines. When I started this job, I couldn't tell you the difference between an americano, cappuccino, or latte. My coffee experiences had been limited. When I was a teen, I drank the stuff, just to stay awake after a hard night of partying followed by a hard night of working at Burger King. The black, oily fast food drip that no one in their right mind should quaff. Those were my first coffee experiences.

In the Navy, it was the same thing. Attending "A" school in Great Lakes, Illinois, my roommate would brew a pot with his home brewer, then we'd settle down for the night, and mostly talk about Star Trek: The Next Generation Episodes. Thanks to Jarod Williams, I know a hefty amount of minutiae about that series without having watched a substantial amount of episodes.

I loved that job. At that point in my life, this was the best job I ever had. I showed up, dismantled and reassembled machines, occasionally going on long distance service runs to exotic locations like Union Gap, Yakima or Sequim for emergencies. Also, we could drink as much of the coffee as we wanted. This is how I learned to steam milk, and after many different experiments, and taste tests came to the conclusion that even though a cappuccino is my favorite drink, you can't beat a double latte when it comes to economy. You spend a lot of time making a cap, for less quantity. Lattes take far less time and give you much more beverage. Very practical.

Our claim to fame was a super automatic machine that was manufactured by a company located in Switzerland. A super auto is not a child's toy. I wasn't a novice tech at this point, having worked on radars, and navigational equipment in the Navy, but to this day, even as a heating tech, I still think those super autos were tough cookies!

I blame the coffee. The water didn't help either. From what I saw, most issues with the machines had to deal with coffee either grinding to fine, or to coarse. Not enough, too much, or ending up some place it didn't belong throwing a wrench in the process. Forgive the bad pun, but organic materials will take on a life of their own, and this it would do, with a vengeance.

Since we were a distributor, the Swiss company felt obligated to send their technical rep over once in a while to see how things were going stateside. I still remember him quite well. Ueli was dressed head to toe in black. He wasn't tall, or short. He had black spiky hair, and he spoke irony filled English in a Swiss German accent. My kind of guy.

A conversation came up about coffee, as it is a well known fact that Americans drink their joe different than a Euro would . . . as we do most things I suppose. The question turned to taste: Bitter, or smooth, which was preferred? Ueli observed our bickering with a knowing half smile on his face and said something that I've held onto all these years and can't imagine ever letting go of.

"What's the difference?" he said, "Coffee is like pants. You can't tell someone how to wear their pants in a way that makes them comfortable."

This is a common knowledge, simple, effective, statement, that I might go so far to proclaim as a universal truth. It struck a chord with me, because for a long part of my life, I let people tell me how to wear my pants.

Not any more.

Beginnings

10 years ago, was a tumultuous time for me. Life, is a series of ups and downs, strung together in an awkward fashion that eventually become irrelevant once you run out of time. I had lots of time on my hands, having been unceremoniously dumped by a girl at that time and losing my job with the US Navy.

I had started to hang out with an ex of mine from my hometown of Anchorage. Coincidentally, she had ended up in Seattle as well. How we rediscovered each other is a story for another day, but we had. With this rediscovery, a renewal began, starting with the desire to restart our friendship first . . . at least on my end. She may tell you something completely different, and I won't pretend to read into her thoughts on the matter. Let's just say that we parted under difficult circumstances.


She had fallen into a couple of free passes that would allow us to get our fortunes told at a little place in Wallingford. I have always been a little kooky when it comes to things like that, especially if they're free. So I made the trek over from Bremerton on a weekend, picked her up and we headed to the seer's place to discern our future.

Some things that you must understand about me before I reveal to you what was foretold. I am a skeptic by nature, not of the doubting sort, but of the "How would I take this apart and put it back together sort?" I would never profess to having an uncanny intuition into the souls of men. Hardly. I find all of y'all confusing, but that doesn't stop me from making my inferences and deducing what I may. When it comes to folks' intentions though, I take them with a grain a salt. In other words, I believe in results, because we all talk a good game. Especially, the worst of us. Show me, don't tell me.


My immediate thought upon entering this establishment centered around keeping my wallet in my pocket. Knowing there is no such thing as a free lunch, I figured the same thing applied to fortunes. We all have bills to pay, right? I'm not suggesting that I entered with a closed mind, quite the contrary, the process excited me! However, I decided that it would probably be in my best interests to keep that to myself and go about the procedure as stoically as possible.

Upon entering the place, we were separated and each brought to our respective prognosticator. My memory may fail me on the details, but I do recall a middle aged lady with frazzled black hair, eyeglasses perched on the end of her nose, and mouth wrinkles, the type one can only get from smoking. She took my left hand without a moment's blush and looked at my life line. After observing the geography of my hand she diagnosed my fate:


First, she intoned that I would start my own business, most likely by the time I was 28. I'll spare you the math and tell you that I happened to be 21 at that time and the thought of starting my own business wasn't an idea remotely close to any thoughts I had about life in general. To be clear, the thought of doing such repulsed me. See, I hate doing paperwork of any type. Period. So that's out the window. Just the thought of having to learn a little tax code knowledge and deal with the local bureaucracy, had also lain that idea to rest before it could germinate. No sir, that wasn't in the plans. I recall that I smiled and thought to myself "Well that's that then." My lack of faith in humanity being renewed. (More on that later!)


She then asked me about the woman that I came in with it. "Do you have a relationship?"


Caught off guard, due to the delicate nature of our situation, I'm sure that I responded in the affirmative, with caveats. "We used to, but no."

"Well," she said with absolute certainty. "She is not the one for you. There is another that will make you happy." With that proclamation, she produced a deck of tarot cards and implied that we had now come to the paying part of our program. I politely excused myself, thanking her for her time and went outside to ponder my fate.

Here it is, ten years from what was certainly an obscure moment in my life. One that, although I wouldn't say it haunts me, maybe it resides in my psyche like a small poltergeist, knocking around poking and prodding, shuffling things here and there, behaving as a general nuisance. I often wonder what that women who sat across from table from me, boldly declaring the path I was to take saw. I know that I attempted to suppress my thoughts, biting my tongue so hard that the caustic remarks I could have made never had a chance to leave my mouth. Did I frump myself into that chair, with an annoyed look on my face, jaw so firmly set that she could hear it pop with each answer she gave? Did my eyes betray the fact that I had just gotten out of a relationship and was still reeling from my new found singularity? Could she have guessed, that the woman I had walked in there with I had once declared the love of my life, and promised repeatedly that I would marry her, only to be ungracefully dumped shortly after leaving Anchorage to join the Navy?

As I type this, that same woman, the one that wasn't meant for me, lies asleep in the bed that we share, in the house that we own, wearing two rings on her left ring finger that symbolize our all encompassing love for each other. One for me zip for the seer.

I do have a business plan, finally although it's a mediocre one. Some day I will actually begin producing works of fiction with the hopes of selling them for a profit. Could this be what the fortune teller had meant? We'll call that a push until I realize the dream.

So where does that leave me? I still have a way to go in my journey before I can make a statement with any substance. I am happy though, and only foresee myself getting happier. As I get older, I've found that it's much easier to shape your reality rather than be forced into a situation that you don't desire. I have dreams, some that may be revealed in time on this blog, and some that I will keep close to myself until they realize themselves. I'm hardly in any position to complain about the direction my life has taken.


This, is a good thing.