Have I not written about this place before? Apparently not. I travelled here dragging a big book to read, but finding myself compelled to muse on this café instead. Last year I'd come here a lot. It's small, with one table filling the room and a couple of shelf-tables on one side, with stools. Capacity is limited and before long you're sharing space with some other hapless flaneur, reading a paper or waiting for an associate or two. The table juggles us: those in groups move to the more spacious spaces; the solitary individuals fill in the gaps. Today I am the latter.
Occasionally, conventions crumble and we lapse into conversation. Once, I was sitting at the end, by the window, and a decorative classical guitar. Despite the café being at street level, there is a stark drop out the back, and I feared for the life of the man cleaning the windows, balancing on the ledge outside. Bad things don't happen if you aren't watching, I told myself, and continued to read. On this day I met Carol, from Bermuda. I must look trustworthy because she asked me to keep an eye on her phone, which was plugged into a wall, while she disappeared for a few minutes. Keep an eye on it for what purpose? So it doesn't gets stolen. Stolen by whom? A stranger. And, what am I if not a stranger? The chance to liberate an expensive phone from a preoccupied Bermudan had at last arrived. Was I to take it? I glanced towards the door. Only a busy barista was there, rearranging pastries. Behind me, the window cleaner regained his balance and kept cleaning. My coffee was half full, as they say. I envisioned the imminent dart out the door, yanking the phone from the socket en route, laughing hysterically as I ran down the centre of the road with my prize. Perhaps I'd steal a car while I'm in the mood, and flee the country.
The Bermudan was back. She thanked me for watching her phone and took a seat on the table. Just the two of us here, overlooked by the secondary characters, the barista and window-cleaner. She introduced herself as Carol. During our conversation it materialised that she was drawing me. The brief subjection to a photograph is unnerving to me, so imagine what being drawn was like. At least it's not as accurate as a photo; that's its redeeming quality. Sadly I know no way to get in touch with Carol now.
Today, prospects of negotiating a conversation with another human seem slight. The day just doesn't seem to hold that promise. Air's second album is on. It holds memories about which I am uncertain - memories yet to become classified, but are aroused by this album like a scent transports you to a forgotten past.
Like I say, last year I came here a lot. Less so now. Maybe I'm too busy or too poor. It's £1.80 for a 'long black'. I think the coffee may have got slightly worse, or perhaps my standards have raised. Or maybe it's an off-day. I still find it a place well worthy of my time though. And the effect on the brain of this not-bad coffee, combined with the pressure of the day - which I put down to the weather and the unmanageable things in life which require endless lists, ordering and reordering, before inevitably refusing to be sorted anyway - is still, I must say, pretty remarkable.
The staff chatter and clatter their pots. The atmosphere in here is nearly at bursting point. I think if someone said something to me - 'can you pass the sugar' - the moment would be so profound, so at odds with this strange dream, it would throw me from this circulating inner conversation I am having with myself, throw me back into something like reality, and I'd break right down.
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