Coffee Novelist

Something to think about

Coffee Novelist

October 3, 2019

Yesterday I took an hour drive to have breakfast with my oldest son. We were joined by his significant other, my daughter and my sister. After the mid-morning food, I undertook three more hours in the car to get back home which included a stop for coffee at a Starbucks. For some, that time driving amounts to the time they spend commuting every week to work and back. On a short week. In any case it seems like a good deal of driving just to have breakfast.

I wanted to see my oldest son at some point over the long holiday weekend and this proved to be the simplest way. For me, it was an easy decision and time well spent. We had good food, a good time and good talk, costing me four hours in the car. I wonder if Howard Schultz would spend four hours in a car to visit a 25 year old Starbucks location?

No easy answer to that question or proposition is there? In fact, it could be dismissed as clearly unanswerable and simply odd. But that is the kind of question I hope all of you who read Tripio put to yourself in some form or fashion. To fully grasp where I am going with this you will have to read Tripio. Because, in Tripio Jay is asking himself to measure the value of a family, compared to the value of a growing company, compared to the value of work of creative imagination. By some measures, he can’t do it. But, please read Tripio and see for yourself what happens.

I have come to the conclusion that I wrote Tripio in part to forgive Jay for not being able to see the future, for not being wise enough to know what his future would bring. None of us know that. But, I am not alone in being way, way too hard on myself.

Twenty five years later, after seeing way more of that future that Jay found so murky, I have mellowed a great deal. I have forgiven Jay for not being Nostradamus. I am content and blessed that his future found me. To understand this more fully please buy and read….

https://www.amazon.com/Tripio-novel-Starbucks-Millionaire-Novelist-ebook/dp/B07NQ1413V

And, to answer the question above, I would drive four hours again today if that is what it took to see my oldest son. In fact, I could make it in less than four hours if I didn’t stop at a Starbucks along the way.

May I help who’s next?”

Picasso horse

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September 30, 2019

Computers are useless-all they can give you are answers.

–Pablo Picasso

In Tripio, Jay is suddenly transferred from his nearby Starbucks to a location in suburban Chicago. He has no car so must rise at four a.m. to make the two train commute. He has to first take the El downtown and then walk several blocks to catch the Metra train heading west. That walk takes him through Jackson Square, crossing under the watchful eye of the “Picasso horse” statue. At this point in Tripio, Jay feels his life is no longer under his control. His dream of living the solitary life of a writer in a shack in Costa Rica is gone, unattainable. This sudden transfer to the suburbs has shaken Jay at a time when he was already mentally quite fragile. The city and square are nearly empty at five am. Jay’s only regular companion is the Picasso horse, who he now believes is alive and watching him as he crosses in front of it.

Does this mean that Jay knows his dream of living as a writer is dead? And can only be wishfully reanimated by the Picasso horse? Does is mean that Jay is losing his marbles just a little as the fear of parenthood shakes him to the core? Does the horse now represent Starbucks as a growing beast watching Jay’s every move? How the hell do I know? I just wrote Tripio. It’s up to you ,the reader, to decide that.

I started this post because I came across the above quote with the intent of tying it to Tripio via the Picasso Horse . I have done that, but lucky for you I am not finished. Here goes the bonus content… I wonder all the time about cell phones. What is so interesting about them? What it is in them that wasn’t there before? Why are the so enticing that many of us risk are lives to look at one while we drive?

Why am I asking so many questions? Because that is where the answers are, not in the devices at all. There are only answers and ultimately, and answers are boring, as Picasso is saying above. If the question in your mind is worth pursuing at all it must roll around and occupy your mind for hours or even days. So put down that phone and think, especially if you are driving, but not before hitting the link to buy Tripio on Amazon- https://www.amazon.com/Tripio-novel-Starbucks-Millionaire-Novelist-ebook/dp/B07NQ1413V

May I help who’s next?

Coffee and writing

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September 29, 2019

It is not yet seven a.m. on Sunday morning. And I have been up for close to ninety minutes. This is my schedule. I have come to the conclusion that sleeping in is overrated. This is my day off and one hears a lot about how others relish the chance to “sleep in” on their off days. I can’t, even if I try, I can’t. So, I get up and make coffee. Or, I simply warm up the leftovers from the day before and get to work. I always, always, always have a cup of coffee near me when I write.

vpjayant [CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)%5D

This brings me to Stephen Fry. I read once that when he was working on a screenplay for Peter Jackson he could not get going on it to save his skin. It took him awhile to understand the reason but it struck him that at the time he was working on the screenplay he was trying to give up smoking. Smoking energized his mind while at the same time the smoking ritual calmed and rewarded him as he wrote. I feel almost exactly the same about my cups of coffee. This morning, I am wondering if I could have written Tripio without coffee?

One indisputable answer is no. No coffee, no Starbucks. No Starbucks, no Tripio. Starbucks did not invent coffee. I drank plenty of coffee before Starbucks was available. In Tripio, Jay refers to a coffee house where he was working before he moved to Chicago. And even after Jay is working at Starbucks, he often goes to a favorite coffee house that “sat on an alley under the El tracks”. I come by my love of coffee honestly. Hey, I loved coffee before it was trendy and pricey.

The point here, however, isn’t how cool I am. I was thinking as I started this post that it could be a bad thing that I believe I have to have a cup of coffee within arm’s reach anytime I write. At times, I know that I will not drink the contents of the mug but that I have to have it close regardless. If I were feeling somehow inadequate about myself for not being able to write without coffee near, I arrived at the conclusion to stop it. One reason is that I am in good company with Stephen Fry. The second is that I would have never responded to the Starbucks want ad if I hadn’t already loved coffee. For proof I refer again to Tripio and Jay thinking to himself “about the only real qualification I have is that I’m a coffee lover.”

And I am not alone! The spectacular growth of Starbucks confirms this. If you are reading this blog with a cup of coffee nearby, then drink up! If you are doing so at your local coffee house or Starbucks then that’s even better. If you have come across this post on National Coffee Day 2019, that may prove that coffee is as much a part of your life as it was Jay’s. How cool is that?

“May I help who’s next?”

What to do with Tripio?

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September 28, 2019

There it sits a few feet away. In book form. A book. My book. What to do with it? The box actually arrived three days ago. I knew what was in the box and opened it with a kitchen knife. My first thought was that Tripio is bigger and thicker than I thought, than I expected. It didn’t “feel” like 333 pages when I was writing it. Wait, wait! On second thought, I did plan every word, comma and space. Because I wanted the final printed, for sale edition to end up being 333 pages. Threes. Tripio. Three storylines. What I genius I am!

Of course the above is nonsense. Except maybe the part about me being a genius. Actually, if I were that smart, I would have done something brilliant with my five proof copies of Tripio. Yet, after I took one out of the box and looked it over with a smile, I let them sit in that box, on the table across from where I now write this post.

Those couple of days later it is occuring to me that I think I was afraid I wouldn’t like Tripio anymore. Tripio arriving as a real book was like your best friend from high school or college dropping by after not seeing you in twenty years. Would you still like him or her? Would he or she like you? I wanted to retrieve the journals I kept while writing Tripio and find the entries that I wrote in which I was excited about the creation of Tripio. I wanted to find the passage I wrote when I knew Tripio was great and I was doing all I could to write a unique and wonderful book. I did not. I simply went about my work week. I let some friends a family know that the proof copies were in my possession and that was about it.

I think that it felt odd to have Tripio back in the house because I had been practicing giving it away. I have made it an intention during my morning yoga to release attachments and expectations to and for Tripio. It is no longer mine. It did not feel comfortable to have it to myself again in my house. Like the old friend whose jokes no longer makes you laugh. What do you do? After a couple days the answer came.

I decided to take my old friend Tripio out in public where we could relax together and get reacquainted. This was yesterday, the third day after getting the proof copies. And my off day. I packed Tripio in my bag and we headed off to Coat Check coffee https://www.coatcheckcoffee.com/.

It made sense. It was a way of coming full circle. Remember that Tripio was actually born over 25 years ago in Chicago’s coffee houses and early Starbucks locations.

So, in the spacious and calm environs of Coat Check, my dear old companion and I got reacquainted. The coffee of the day was an Ethiopian, always a favorite varietal of mine. This felt right. As the barista called out the occasional drink order in the background I read the first chapter and felt relieved that I still liked my dear old friend. Relieved and needing to relieve myself, I got up to use the facilities. Upon returning to my table, I saw my thicker than expected copy awaiting me, looking content and relaxed on that table next to my mug of coffee, as if it had known this would happen.

“May I help who’s next?”

What is old is new in the New Yorker

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September 26, 2019

I have recently given myself credit for creating a new word: Starbattical. Do you like it? I define it as long retreat or break from Starbucks. I came up with it to describe the 20 some years I was either too busy, too poor or using my time to raise a raise a family to take much notice of Starbucks.

With the writing and publishing of my “Starbucks novel” Tripio, I have come off my Starbattcial. Odd how things come full circle. In the early nineties when I traveled home from Chicago to seed the land with bags of Starbucks coffee I was asked about a company no had ever heard of. These days I am being asked about a company every has heard of.

I am also being sent articles on Starbucks by family and friends once again. In the ninteles the articles were more likely to bear the headline something similar to “Starbucks to open stores in my city.” Now I get them like the one I received about Starbucks in the New Yorker.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/02/04/save-our-starbucks

If you read the article you know it concerns Starbucks closing one of its own stores. In the aforementioned novel, Tripio, the protagonist Jay has been working at a Starbucks in Chicago for a couple years. Starbucks was certainly not closing its own stores in those days. It was opening stores and attracting lots of attention while doing it, as the excerpt from Tripio shows…

The reason she was here was that she represented a coffee company just getting started on the Atlantic Coast. Was I interested? Cosmodemonic had bought a good-sized competitor in Boston not long ago, so I knew there was competition out there. My ego was happy to be talking to her. But I was an owner here at my store. This was my store. Here in my city. And it struck me that Kati would figure in all these decisions now. That was it. The source of my distraction most of the night. Only I hadn’t realized it. A big change was coming in my life. So, I turned the competitor down. Looking back, I don’t think she sought me out personally. I have a feeling she was canvassing the nearby, if not all, Cosmodemonics to see who was interested. I did put her business card in my bag, however.

The Starbucks location Jay worked at in Tripio was one of the busier locations in the city, especially on weekends. So much so that Jay finds himself wishing that “ they hurried up and opened more stores so these people could go somewhere else.” Jay had other things to think of in Tripio. He hadn’t realized that the IPO of Starbucks stock he was about to take part in was happening in part to generate revenue to open more and more Starbucks. And a quarter century later, they haven’t stopped.

An exception to that last observation is the location discussed in the above article. The loyal customers would seem to provide a good enough base to do a good coffee house business, if not quite up to Starbucks standards. Hmmm, makes me wonder if that card is somewhere in my bag after all these years.

“May I help who’s next?”

How Starbucks gave me butterflies

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September 19, 2019

In the process of attempting to publish Tripio, I have tried to research any other books in which Starbucks features prominently. I am curious to see if there is another book out there similar to Tripio. I know most of the business success books written about Starbucks the company. In what seems a million year ago I read “Pour your heart into it” by my old boss, Howard Schultz.

This morning I found a book about Starbucks that I had not heard of. It is called “How Starbucks Saved my Life” by Michael Gates Gill. I read a bit about this book and it does not appear to be a novel, but more a real life account. It was published in 2007 and I may or may not read it. I am sure over the course of the next several months I will come across other books, novels or not, with a Starbucks tie-in. I may or may not read them.

It is not so much that I am afraid to compare Michael Gates Gill’s experience at Starbucks to mine. His experience and mine appear to be completely different, as they should be, since we are two completely different people. I would, however, like to hear his descriptions of working the espresso bar at his Starbucks. In Tripio, Jay calls the espresso bar at store #204 “the beating heart of the growing Cosmodemonic empire.” ( Please see post #42, when published, for a more detailed explanation of the use of Cosmodemonic). And for Jay, the espresso bar is the place where he must prove himself to the customers and, more importantly, to his fellow baristas. Because to take the bar on a busy Saturday morning, we are talking 1,000 transactions by noon in those days, and deal with the line was how you earned and kept the respect of your co-workers.

That is Jay’s experience and so it follows that it was also my experience. And, please don’t think any worse of me for saying this: I don’t really care about anybody else’s experiences at Starbucks. Because, I lived mine. I felt the butterflies in my stomach as I prepared to open on Saturday mornings knowing a three hour line of customers awaited me. This feeling mirrors and parallels what I felt when writing Tripio. I temporarily lost interest in reading other novels. I wanted to tell my own story. I am not sure if I am alone in this. I wonder if many, any, or no other writers felt this way while working on a project of theirs. These observations do not at all mean that I don’t want to share Tripio with as many people as possible. Maybe it isn’t that complicated after all. Maybe my apprehensions about putting Tripio out in the world really mean I am just a little fearful about sharing my own very personal story. I may just be coming down with a case of butterflies in my stomach, much like Jay did before those busy Saturday mornings over twenty years ago at store #204.

My mind code

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September 18, 2019

I am very protective of my mind. Not my brain. In order to appreciate this blog in its length and breadth, especially the few posts that don’t directly concern my crass, yet entertaining attempts to sell Tripio, that must be made clear. Take my brain, please. Take it and the five senses that it operates and reacts to.

Henny_Youngman

As for my mind. It is mine. All mine. The good, bad, happy and sad. It is all mine.

Which brings me to my drowned phone device. Don’t ask me how I drowned my phone. All I will offer is that the bag of rice trick didn’t work for me. What does not work in the phone recovery process is not saving your icloud passwords and such. Because, as you all know, the process of recovering everything you have on that device is way more complicated than it needs to be.

But it shouldn’t be. When did this happen? When did we give the important information in our minds to someone else? We should not have to endure questions from ATT, 5/3rd bank, Facebook and countless other entities to access what was once kept in our quite capable minds.

I propose that we each have a unique code that requires them to access our minds. No, I am not ripping off Philip K. Dick, just placing value on the most powerful, unique and wonderful thing we all possess: our own minds.

I say powerful because the ATTs. FBs, banks, etc. are nothing without what it is in there. They need our thoughts. They exist because we put our minds into thoughts that can be acted upon by them. If we keep what is ours where it is accessible only by us, when we need it (ex. When I used to know people’s phone numbers) then drowning a phone device would not be so stressful. Then, what we have in our minds is accessible only with our permission, not the other way around. Doesn’t that make more sense? I think that ATT, FB et al should be contacting me to confirm their identity and trying to remember how to access my thoughts, my mind, so they can take actions created by them. The all say that they are working for us, it’s time to prove it. They need to call, text or email me for permission to get at and use my mind, not the other way around.

May I help who’s next?

Blog class blunder

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September 12, 2019

Yesterday afternoon I went to take my “Building your Blog” class at the Indiana Writers Center. It was the largest of the three classes I have so far taken at IWC. At the start of class our instructor had us do a quick “who are you and why are you here?” introduction as a way of breaking the ice and generating conversation. There were professional people who wanted to offer expert advice for their blogs sitting alongside the “creatives” like me, who wrote fiction or poetry or just wanted to blog for the hell of it.

When it came to my turn to introduce myself I nailed it. I know my name. I know what I currently do for a living. No problems there. But when it came to describing Tripio I blew it. I had hoped to reel off a couple intriguing, fascinating sentences describing Tripio and then answer questions from the rest of the attendees along the lines of “When does it come out? And “How soon can I buy a copy? That didn’t happen. I stopped and restarted. I mumbled and talked too fast, then paused and restarted again. I think I ended by saying the pointless, “I love it.”

Luckily, our instructor saved me. He had taught in quite a few environments and must have been used to pulling bodies from the verbal wreckage. He helped me by restating the plot of Tripio as a question to everyone else. “So, Tripio has three plot lines, one involving a relationship, one involving writing a book and in the other, you as the main character, received over 250 shares of Starbucks stock at the IPO. In …1992??

“Yes. 1992” I replied, once again handling the two word reply like a pro.

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear about not having the stock anymore.” He replied.

“Yea. So am I.” Was my riveting reaction, though I was proud of myself for having used four words this time.

To be honest I did recover over the course of the next three hours and managed to receive positive feedback and comment about Tripio. That in turn provided motivation for me to write again this morning.

And as you know, I am writing this blog in part to help and prepare aspiring writers in as many ways as I can, based on my present experiences, not any past success. This morning, in researching my journals (Sketchbooks of the Mind) for this post, I came across this entry about Tripio, -“I have no doubt at all in Tripio. In its creation, authenticity & purity. For it to work, it cannot be preconceived. It has to just happen. It has to be read as if it is just happening.” Which for me, is also how this blog is going to work best. This is a day in the life account of my efforts to publish Tripio. I have never tried to publish a book before and am discovering that it entails a lot of things I didn’t expect. One of which is describing your book to a room full of strangers. And blowing it.

Which brings me to an inspirational quote from Eleanor Roosevelt that I have kept close for years now…”In life you must do the things you think you cannot do.” In my case, as you just read, I could write Tripio. It is everything else I have yet to do.

“May I help who’s next?”

Run, Howard, run-or not

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September 7, 2019

“Your buddy Howard is thinking about running for president. Could be good for the book”

Above is the text I received this morning. The text was from an old friend who appears in Tripio as my “older brother”. I have been advised to get reviews of Tripio http://tinyurl.com/y6tfe6he for the Amazon page. So, I have been. And the “older brother” from Tripio now has the manuscript in his hands and is hopefully enjoying the living hell out of reading it.

[[File:’Man Reading’ by John Singer Sargent, Reading Public Museum.jpg|’Man Reading’ by John Singer Sargent, Reading Public Museum]]

Since Tripio is partially about Starbucks and Howard Schultz, I feel obligated to comment on how I think he will perform as president. Except, I don’t really know, so I won’t. All I know for sure is that the one time I met him in person he handed me a Bean Stock Bravo award. The meeting is recounted in Tripio, “HS called some partners to the stage for recognition. I was one of them. He called my name about halfway through the presentation (he mispronounced the last name, and I politely corrected him), handed me a Cosmo Bravo award and shook my hand.”

I reflect upon the historic meeting now and will not let Howard mispronouncing my name influence whether I will vote for him if he runs for president. I will rise above that. But I do want Howard to run for president for my sake.

I say that only half kidding because I suspect there is a lot of truth in lot of truth what my friend texted me. In fact I did text him back replying, “My thoughts exactly.”

Odd thing just occurred to me as I write this post. It feels right to use just Howard in referring to possible presidential candidate Howard Schultz. In my four years at Starbucks, everyone referred to Howard as Howard. It seemed to fit him to use his first name only. The other bigshot in the hierarchy at the time was Howard Behar. In Tripio I use HS and HB to make the distinction. But in those days it was not uncommon to have one of them visit Chicago. After all when Tripio takes places there were only 125 Starbucks stores and 500 employees. But everyone could tell which Howard was coming to visit by the slight change in tone when one said “Howard is coming to town.” Both meant lots of extra cleaning in case they showed up at your store. But the Howard in Howard Schultz visiting had a little more excitement or buzz in the pronouncement. Not of fear, but of anticipation.

Like I said, I have no idea how that recollection relates to Howard as president. I just felt obligated to share it. Also, I am sure Howard has practiced pronouncing names since we last met.

“May I help who’s next?”

I couldn’t give it away-Part 2

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September 5, 2019

“Here goes.”

I stepped down from the small but elevated stage at Indy Reads Books with copies of Tripio in hand and headed for the shelves. The store closed in ten minutes and I had decided to give my novel away. No matter that it had been born in a series of journals I kept over 20 years ago. No matter that those journals had survived several moves, a basement flood and 20 years of neglect. No matter that resurrecting those journals and turning them into a novel may have changed the course of my life.

The Greek had advised me to give Tripio away. He had said not to hold the book to close. To let it go. That Tripio was no longer mine. That it was our job now to get the book out there. That the reader has no emotional stake in how Tripio came to be. Why the fuck should they care?

The last thought was mine. It was true. The Greek was right. No one came knocking on my door two years ago and asked me to write a novel based on my life at a Starbucks location in Chicago during the summer of 1992. No one called me and requested I add a love story. Popular demand wasn’t accountable for me adding the story line about writing my first novel. The world at large didn’t demand Tripio ask the reader to consider the value of three types of creation: a business, a work of art, a family. No. No one cared if and what I was writing then. Having finished writing what I was writing, had not changed anything in the world at large. That in mind, Tripio still in hand, I was about to meet my indifferent public, to give away my masterpiece.

The Greek was right again. I felt great on the way home, nine boxes of unopened books in my trunk. I did not sell a copy of Tripio. But, receiving Tripio had made some half dozen people happy. One mother of a teen-aged coffee fan even requested I sign Tripio for her son. She was thrilled that her son was going to get a signed copy of Tripio, a book as much about coffee as anything else. As a parent myself, her joy hit close to home. Giving Tripio away had made me happy. Giving the book away had power. Tripio was out there now, on its way to being appreciated.

And it was a great feeling.

“May I help who’s next?”