Cafe Observations

I'll pay
No you will not!
Don't take her money
Here here.
Stop it. You always do this!

The lid on my cup came off. I could have spilled hot coffee on my baby.

My coffee is cold. Can you heat it up in the microwave?

I have waited in line to order for 10 minutes and now I have been waiting 15 minutes for my coffee.

You just need to change the throw on the pour there a little.

It's really busy! Well lucky people are understanding.
Not always. People get pretty horrible when they have to wait.
Really?
Yeah, I just had someone correct me on how to pour his coffee.
Really?
Yes. 


This post is partly about complaining about the treatment I have received from customers. It is also a reflection on people and anxiety in society.

I suffer from anxiety and depression. I know how to stress and be sad better than most. Yet when I am at work when I am the person working weekends and public holidays and we are super busy it is the customers that get stressed and annoyed with me. They are the ones that complain about wait times and how I made their coffee.

They are so stressed about having the power in relationships with their friends that they MUST pay for the meal. They must pay lest they be placed under the power of their friend once again who ALWAYS pays.

Is it just people pn the lower north shore who do this or is it australia?

I have this friend who comes in. She's from the ghettos in Chicago and now lives on the lower north shore of Sydney. Bit of a change. Anyway. She is always a delight and her children always so kind.

She is never sweating the small stuff or getting angry with children. She always has time to be kind and polite.

RJ. A young man from Compton in LA. Runs basketball camps during the school holidays. Such a delight.Why is it that he despite his stresses in life and living as a black man in the lower north shore is so kind and encouraging to see around? He has plenty of stories to tell I'm sure.

Why is it that some are so consumed with the small stresses in life and others seem to have the most amazing perspedctive on life?

My coleageu said to me, you could have also tripped and smashed your babies face into the concrete. But that didn't happen either. So why are we so indignant about the coffee lid?

Promises

The psalms have many people suffering. They turn their suffering to God. They pray.

Man sometimes I feel so sad. I just melt into the couch. Feel like I cannot move.

Am I to turn this suffering to God? Or do I blame him for the suffering either because he allows it or because he inflicts it?

Neither is good and he is responsible for both.

So I turn to God in anger and distress and I don't feel like calling him good but I believe he is there and that he is King.

The cry is to God to save. And the hope is steadfast that he will.

I want my faith to be like that of the psalms. Real with the pain but confident in hope that God is listening, will hear the prayer and reach into my life to save me from it and/or bring me through it. I am done with hopelessness. I am done with skeltical reserved perspectives that hold me back from confident hope because I don't want to be disappointed. Shielding myself from pain. Dare to confidently hope.

Do we dare to be happy?

I take a step.
I take another step.
And another.
I have just gotten out of bed and my ankles hurt straight away.
Is pain the only indicator that I am alive?

Dressed I step out the door,
A small step to the pavement.
Dark.
Always dark.

A hand to the wind,
The swinging of a door,
Greeted by the familiar silence of a miserable bus driver.

The sun swings over the water,
It greets me over the ANZAC bridge.

I take a step,
I take another step.
And another.
I turn around back to my wife and kiss her gently.
She smiles through her sleep.

Dressed I step out the door,
Two feet first I bound to the pavement,
Greeted by the darkness and a freezing winter breeze,
This is my street greeting me before any of my neighbours.

A hand to the wind,
A flash of light and a rush of warm air,
I greet the bus driver and this time the black dog is no where to be seen.

And he has not been back for quite a while. 

A junction.
A gear change.
A game changer.

We see moments of change in mechanical metaphors. What happened to organic metaphors of plants and ones of child birth? Natural things.

Our lives are an evolution. Pain doesn't mean something is broken. Frustration doesn't mean we're doing anything wrong.

How do we understand change?

We have to understand ourselves differently. Self perception has to change. Identity shifts. Or
We don't. Then we struggle.

We have to put an end to something in order to start something new. This is stressful. How do we roll with these things?


I know how to learn.
I know how to adapt and cope.

This brings confidence. It brings comfort and eases the nerves.

And then there's just the fact that everyone feels like a fraud and we're all faking it till we make it.

Hypocrisy

You’re a hypocrite if you don’t live up to your ideals.

                             But if you can you’re not aiming high enough…

Let emotions well up inside.
Do not allow fear of feeling.
Allow yourself freedom.

Fear not rejection in your courage.
Seek your heart.
Scold not adventure.

Enemies spew evil
My enemy myself
Love thy enemy

Sin incarnate crucified
My punishment not mine
My Evil is not Me

Ben Urich's surly and experienced editor calls everyone together, "All right, listen up, everybody!
"We have reports coming in of multiple explosions all across Hell's Kitchen.
"Hey Henricks, call PD, get a statement.
"Taylor, reach out to your guy at public works and see if gas or methane had anything to do with this."

Ben interrupts, "What are the locations?"

"You see me talking here Urich?"

"I'm just saying it'd help if we knew where we we're going to cover this."

"Caldwell, give me that list. Where are you?
"Please. Come on, come on."
"All right. locations are as follows, 44th and 11th, 48th and 9th, 47th and 12th, 42nd and 10th."

"It's not gas."

"How do you know that?"

"Places that were hit, all controlled by the Russians."

This is part of a transcript for the TV show Daredevil. Season 1, episode 6. It's one of my favorite episodes from one of my favorite TV shows.

I'm not alone in my appreciation for the comic Daredevil and this TV show adaptation. The comics are incredibly popular and the TV show is critically acclaimed as well as loved by fans.

What is the appeal of comics and these shows? They are a hyper-reality that somehow remain relatable despite the protagonists having super-human abilities. Why would we care? Surely we would have just written off these stories as child like and ridiculous long ago.

However I think they continue to remain relevant and appealing for what we hope for in our own lives. They offer something exciting for the bored; victory for the defeated; strength for the weak. Ultimately though, I believe they tell a story of ability to overcome.

We are constantly faced with our own inabilities, faced with frustrations and the need to overcome. Whether angry with society and the fat cats that hold us down or the people closest to us that hurt us without cause comics tell a story of people that seem more capable than us to overcome the problems they face. This is a story that we need and a story that we long for in our own lives; the superhuman ability to overcome.

For me this is a story that I need in my life. I am constantly faced more and more each day with the depth of my illness. This cloud, this aggressive fog that permeates my mind and makes me act and do things that I would not otherwise do. It makes me worse than I am, and I am bad enough as it is. This is unacceptable.

I need to overcome this. I need the ability to win and defeat the monsters that rage within and change me. I fear though that I cannot. The stories in comics, and the story of Daredevil - Matt Murdock - is one that inspires me though. It brings me hope that if someone like Matt can overcome his problems and enemies, no matter how big they are, that I in the comparably smaller problems can overcome them. Even if I don't have superhuman abilities.

We have reports coming in of multiple explosions all across Hell's Kitchen. Hey, Henricks, call PD, get a statement. Yeah. Taylor, reach out to your guy at public works and see if gas or methane had anything to do with this. What are the locations? You see me talking here, Urich? I'm just saying, it'd help if we knew where we were going to cover this. Caldwell, give me that list. Where are you? Please. Come on, come on. All right, locations are as follows, 44th and 11th, 48th and 9th, 47th and 12th, 42nd and 10th. It's not gas. How do you know that? Places that were hit, all controlled by the Russians.

Read more at: http://transcripts.foreverdreaming.org/viewtopic.php?f=270&t=17737&sid=f7367a3224a884162f73fe05b7d72880

We have reports coming in of multiple explosions all across Hell's Kitchen. Hey, Henricks, call PD, get a statement. Yeah. Taylor, reach out to your guy at public works and see if gas or methane had anything to do with this. What are the locations? You see me talking here, Urich? I'm just saying, it'd help if we knew where we were going to cover this. Caldwell, give me that list. Where are you? Please. Come on, come on. All right, locations are as follows, 44th and 11th, 48th and 9th, 47th and 12th, 42nd and 10th. It's not gas. How do you know that? Places that were hit, all controlled by the Russians.

Read more at: http://transcripts.foreverdreaming.org/viewtopic.php?f=270&t=17737&sid=f7367a3224a884162f73fe05b7d72880