The trouble with the world today it seems to me is coffee in a cardboard cup.
— song by Kander and Ebb
The whole world is cardboard now: politics, movies and television — even our cars. Scratch a Toyota Prius and see what I mean.
So it’s no surprise that Starbucks and its famous cardboard cups is having trouble.
It’s not the coffee. The coffee is fine, and the cups don’t leak.
Really can’t say about the coffee; I only buy hot chocolate.
The wait staff is troubled. It changes weekly, sometimes between customers, but that’s happening everywhere.
Right next door Supercuts has a sign on the door. “The whole world is short-staffed. Be kind to those who show up,” it says. Ain’t it the truth?
The baristas. At the moment I have memorized only six names. The manager, Lisa — a pleasant, smiling professional — is like the pilot on the Titanic, where each day a new iceberg emerges.
A story almost out of the Bible. When Cain slew Abel, Adam asked, “What’s with that kid?”
Eve shrugged, took a bite of her apple, and replied, “Kids today.”
Let’s give ‘em credit. Starbucks baristas have the cutest aprons in town, so that wherever a window slides open and someone hands you a cup of coffee that you just ordered from a faceless voice on a box, drop a tip in the box.
All fast food and drink houses employ young people who would rather be somewhere else.
But my Starbucks crew features Barbara with a green hair; a bright part-time preacher, Erik; there’s Adam, a smart musician headed towards fame in Nashville; Alex, a bright married girl who just got some new face jewelry; and Jacob, a part-time, temporary nihilist.
My short-term memory is too fragile to remember all the names. Why do you think I call my wife “She?”
For those of you still struggling with Latin, I looked it up.
Barista is a Euro word for “bartender,” usually a coffeehouse guy like Angelo in Rome or Klaus in the Berlin Starbucks. They closed the Starbucks in Moscow; Ivan has fled to Ukraine.
Starbucks was named after the first mate on Ahab’s Pequod. And I’m thinking: isn’t it risky to name a business after a sinking ship?
Bored? Let’s talk about my history with coffee.
My mother boiled Maxwell House coffee in a green pot on the stove, added egg shells and New Orleans chicory. One sip of that with Wheaties, and I never had coffee again until New York.
For centuries, and especially in New York acting classes, the standard pickup line was, “Youwannagetacupofcoffee?”
Long before, “Ya wanna get a drink?” and “Tinder,” coffee was the cheapest way to start a romance.
I took She, who was so-not-impressed, to our first cup of coffee with nickels that I slipped into a slot in the last New York City automat.
There was no “barista,” just a crabby old lady named Lorraine who knitted under the counter, and who gave you a handful of nickels to use. I miss Lorraine and the automat, but I got the girl.
There was Chock full o’Nuts, a chain that served nut bread cream cheese sandwiches and great coffee that the ad guys used, but it was pricey.
That was a long time before drive-thrus, sliding windows and cute girls in green aprons. We were all young then and working for $1.50 an hour.
But give it a try and see if it still works.
“Youwannagetacupofcoffee?”
Don’t let her order the Venti.
J.P. Devine is a Waterville writer.
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