harrar

harrar
Originally uploaded by rod lewis

I had a very skunky cup of the coffee this morning. By very skunky, I don't mean the undrinkable cup of robusta I had at Dunkin Donuts in Philadelphia. That, my friends, was the only cup of coffee(?) from which I've taken but one sip, and dropped into the recycling bin. Rather, this was the kind of skunky from which one takes a sip, complains of its inferiority, takes another sip and expresses another complaint, and thus carries on the pattern to the bottom of the cup.
Until this morning, I had thought the mermaid's consistent mediocrity to be utterly trustworthy. It may not be the finest there is, but you can always count on consistency.
The irony of it all is that I'm sitting in a very cool space staring at these two wonderful posters of my TOP TWO favorite coffees on the planet. Do you realize how cool is advertising for top shelf when you're sipping back-of-pantry-bottom-shelf fare?
There is a greater irony. I'm sitting in this cool space with two of my students/friends, discussing self-denial, sobriety of heart, and spiritual introspection with ashes on our foreheads in the golden light of dawn meant to bathe in hope the victims of Wednesday morning's storms . Add to that that everyone else in the room also is wearing ashes.
We're all sitting in the atmosphere of the epitome of american consumption (though for the purpose of community) discussing wilderness experience and upon every sip between sentences, I'm complaining inside about the skunkiness of my non-Harrar, and non-Sumatra.
Honestly, I wonder if anyone who harvested my favorite beans could afford the cup of skunky coffee I'm drinking.
Kyrie Eleison