This Moment: 6:27 P.M. January 4, 2011

David Bowie's Glolden Years is playing at Starbucks. I'm sitting in an overstuffed orange chair facing a wall of mirrors. Strange how sobering your own reflection can be. The barristas are laughing. A woman orders a skinny caramel mocha. A girl next to me stands with her legs spayed, her feet encased in buckled military style black leather boots. The store is a cacophony of music and conversation, punctuated with the whir of machines. A young woman discusses her scratched corneas as if discussing the weather. I only have twenty minutes more to hide. Starbucks will close and I will have to leave and go home to my mailbox and it's contents, the laundry, dinner and dishes. I will have to sit with the news of the day. I see myself already on the couch, the dogs vying for pets, an open magazine willing to draw me into it's prose. A piano piece offers an essay on dissonance. Sugar packets are stuffed at odd angles in it's container. The New York Times is focused on the amazing number eight. On very rare occasions such as this moment, jazz can seem like a taunt. A young man with his long hair and abbrieiated soul patch, comes over and apologizes that the store will be closing in fifteen minutes. The woman with the scratched corneas says she's not leaving, then laughs. Two women lean into each other laughing. I know there are tears welling, but I feel nothing but cool air from the outside rushing in when a woman holding her coffee opens the door and leaves.