The Smell of Coffee

The Smell of Coffee


There is a place of wonder that is eternally reserved in my memory, totally suspended in time, living forever in the late 1960’s and it’s in the heart of California. I can return there almost at will, especially when I toss some ground coffee in a pot and add a small amount of boiling water. Then, while I pause to let the grounds briefly steep, before adding the rest of the water, the memory of that place wafts right out of the pot, along with the aroma, like a great Genii and captures my moods and thoughts, and its presence stays with me for a while.
The place I remember is a small outdoor camping, ski and hiking shop in Merced. It is two stories high and has a small loft way up at the top. High up on its inside walls are great pictures of the great mountains, and all around below are the magnificent gadgets required by those who go to see those great sights and make those great pictures. At the very entrance to the shop, right at the front door, there is a wrought-iron table with its chairs, their white paint making them look strangely at home, maybe it is just a California-thing, but they look cool, and they beckon as a lens through which you can pass to change your direction of thought. It was impossible not to stop and pick up and feel those gadgets which were always displayed on this table, and when you did, you instantly became a different being - magically released from the humdrum day and the workaday world, suddenly a fugitive from the streets of Merced, an escapee from your body which you absently-mindedly left standing there at the table. There was also always a dark blue porcelain coffee pot and two or three porcelain mugs, along with instructions explaining how to do all those things that high mountain trekkers must learn to do. One of these instructions told how to make coffee over a campfire; it seems - let me think a moment - I believe you boiled water and then poured it into a pot just like that dark blue porcelain pot that you are holding in your hand right now, and it would already have coffee grounds in the bottom. Not all the water was added at once, as I seem to recall - I believe you first made a kind of “stew” with just a little water and grounds, then a short time later, the rest of the water would be added, and the top put on the pot. When the coffee had steeped long enough, the grounds were settled and the coffee poured. Hmmmm, I seem to have forgotten how the grounds were settled - let me think for a moment ... well, anyway, that initial smell remains, and I can smell it right now. And I see that table again, and the shop with its loft and photos, and then comes the feeling of those wonderful tall trees of California and their great bright mountains. Yes, that was a road I looked down, and yearned in my soul to follow, but it was a trail that I then could not then travel; for then my load was heavy and I pulled a long train. Now come again, thou great sense of joyful freedom; Thou, the sense of my main highway not taken because were were children to raise and wars to wage and an evil empire waiting if I had chosen to travel that trail then; Thou, yes Thou who beckons, I see you smiling and dancing, I hear your singing, and your joyful call: “Come with me, friend, old cake tastes good, it is the best of all, come bring your friend; she too, has marched other lonely trails of duty. But this trail is a dancing trail! Come dance and sing with me; I am a trail of life, leading into a new world. All that should have been will now be found, Glory gives, and Glory calls us to dance and sing. Yes, come dance and follow me, and look, look here: ‘Should Have Been’ grows here, right around this bend, here we call it ‘Beautiful Glory’, here it is, look at it ... behold its great beauty! And over here is a magnificent example of what you call ‘If Only’, it is such a beautiful plant that only grows in rich deep earth, we call it ‘Precious Fulfillment’; see, it really was planted, not lost, and has been growing all these years, right here, waiting for you! Oh, what a time to sing and dance! And follow me - ah look, here is the Sacred Tree itself, the tree of life. Only the wise can dance under its branches for its fruit is not to be eaten, its fruit is the dance of life itself; yes, this is the dancing tree. Let’s join hands and dance: for we are the seeds of that sacred tree.

©John Womack, 2006. All Righs Reserved.