It has been raining in true cats-and-dogs style this past week or so. Everyone is astounded–while as any fool knows this city is very rainy, it usually is “raining” in only the strictest sense of the word, and is more often than not basically just a fine mist. But lo, these many days it has been a blustery downpour, with broken branches littering the paths and byways, and terrifying gusts awakening us all from slumber.
Thus it was that it took me 2 hours to get to school today. I have a 3-bus commute that is usually fairly manageable, though I complain ceaselessly about it. Today, due to the weather, every bus was AT LEAST ten minutes late, which meant that I kept having to re-plan my route while still mid-route, as various transfer possibilities passed me by. Thus also it was that I ended up standing for 30 minutes in the pouring rain literally just on the side of a highway, no bus shelter or anything, like a place where someone would get murdered in a crime drama. I huddled under my fancy golf umbrella and read the NYer article about DJs at the Wynn hotel in Las Vegas and then I read the Ariel Levy article on Edith Windsor and cried, so it was a real roller coaster. Finally I boarded my third bus, which was blessedly just blasting the heat, and I sat down and went through my bag and only then did I discover that I had failed to pack my thermos of coffee. I can not believe how this day is going! What in the honest heck??
The place where I work is completely isolated from anything resembling a neighborhood where there are shops or businesses (hence my bonkers 3-bus commute) and by boarding this final bus I had officially passed the point of no return, in terms of being anywhere near a place to procure coffee. There are some on campus coffee shops but in my experience their posted hours are more just like examples of normal hours a regular coffee place ought to be open, and not necessarily the hours this one is actually open during. Was I going to have to get through an entire 8 hour work day on no coffee? I know I am a drug addict and it is sad, but I actually am not sure I could do it. I think that I would not be able to speak, and my head would fall open and small creatures would come marching out of it and my students would be traumatized.
But things started looking up when I got off the bus on the edge of campus. It was pouring rain, so as the bus pulled away I opened my fancy golf umbrella. Then I looked up, and as the bus finished passing me by, I saw a large white tent with a man standing under it waving at me joyfully. I looked to the right and left but I was the only one standing there. I tentatively waved back. Then he yelled: “DO YOU WANT SOME FREE COFFEE?”
!!
I did!
It turned out that on the last day of September every year they put up a tent and give free coffee and donuts to everyone who doesn’t drive a car to school. Well thank you pal, and congratulations to me!!
That small cup of weird bad coffee just worked wonders on my morale. I chugged it and then went to the on-campus coffee place and it was open and I got an Americano and anyway that’s the end of this thrilling tale
OMGG
I am glad you got terrible free coffee!! Also I feel that your students would probably understand All Too Well if you came into class all dripping and despondent after that ridiculous trial and said “just bear with me guys, I forgot my coffee this morning.” Because THEY KNOW.