I’ve been having a full on “monday morning”, and by that mean that I didn’t want to get up this morning, I’m grumpy for no real reason and everything I try to do seems to be, if not actually being, harder than it needs to be. I have a lunch meeting across town, so decided to go over early and spend a couple of hours at one of my favorite coffee shops that I rarely get to visit. The best part about this place is that they make the absolute best raspberry mocha latte on the planet.  Its not technically on their menu – I discovered it one day when it was a special, and I’ve requested it each time I’ve come since, and they have always obliged.

This raspberry mocha latte was my focus and my purpose for moving all morning. Its rainy and cold out, and traffic was worse than expected getting here, and then all the free parking was gone, and I almost gave up, but the thought of that cup of sweet coffee kept me going. I parked in the garage, took the elevator down, stepped in a puddle and finally walked through the doors of the coffee shop, to find that every couch and comfortable chair had someone in it already. If I were in a better mood, I would take an open chair in a grouping of occupied chairs, but I’m feeling extra-unsocial today, so instead I picked a nice table by the window where I can watch the rain and the cars. There was a long line at the counter, so I decided to get my laptop out and get set up before getting my coffee. Internet didn’t work. Or more specifically, my laptop wasn’t connecting, so had to restart. As I’m restarting, I notice the line is gone, so I grab my wallet and blackberry’s and head toward the counter, and promptly drop one of the blackberry’s (the client one), and the back pops off and the battery goes flying and the people at the nearby tables go “oohhh” in a way that I know is meant to be sympathetic, but that I find intrusive.

I get up to the counter, a new girl is there, I order the raspberry mocha latte and she gives me a skeptical look. “Its not on your menu, but I’ve always been able to get one,” I say, smiling my best friendly smile and thinking I may be driven to violence if she won’t give my latte. She enters “flavor coffee” into the computer and I nod. She puts in hazelnut as the flavor b/c they don’t have a button for raspberry, and I nod, b/c this is what they usually do. I also order a muffin (I’m having a bad day, screw the diet), and she gets the muffin and I take it to my table, wait for a few minutes and then head over to the place where they make the coffee to wait.

After a few minutes the barrista says “you had the raspberry vanilla mocha?” and I hesitate and think, “I don’t have the energy to argue this. I’m not meant to have my coffee today.” So I say, “Ok, sure,” thinking that I might discover a new drink today. He looks at the order slip and says “did you order a raspberry with hazelnut?” and I said, “no actually, I ordered raspberry with mocha,” and he says with a smile ”OK. Well this has hazelnut, so I’ll have to make another.” And I say “Sorry,” because Iam sorry -I ordered off menu, and I know that’s just asking for trouble for everyone, and now they’ve wasted a large cup of coffee. But he says “Don’t be sorry. Please! You asked for something, you should get the thing you asked for, not something else.”

I smiled and said “thank you,” and he said “Of course. So how is your monday going?” and in an uncharacteristic burst of sharing I said “Not great. Its been this coffee that’s kept me going to get here,” and he said “Oh really? Having one of those mornings where nothing is working, huh?” and I felt this urge to hug him for understanding.

“Yes,” I said. “That’s exactly the problem.”

He said “You didn’t have to go to work today though?”

I said, “I’m self employed, so actually I am working,” and I gesture toward the table where I set my laptop up. “Or I will be once I get my coffee.”

He then goes on to comment on how nice it must be to be my own boss, and even on a bad day, at least I don’t have to face a boss, and I agree that that is a perk. Then he asks me what I do  and I tell him I’m a non-profit consultant, and he asks what that means, and I start to explain, and find myself enjoying talking about my work, which is rarely the case. He’s not American, although I can’t identify where he is from from his accent,  and he tells me that his  father worked for an NGO “over there.” And as he’s making my perfect raspberry mocha we discuss the differences between working for an NGO in a developing country and working for a non-profit over here, and he decides, as he’s frothing my milk, that the difference is that here it’s about getting the money, and there its about doing the work and making a difference. On a broad sense, I don’t necessarily agree, but I see his point, and I feel the familiar tug of longing to be doing hands on service again…but I quickly put that urge back in its box and accept my cup of coffee and smile, a genuine – reflection-of-happiness smile for the first time all day.

And then I get back to my table, and decide to use blogging as an excuse to avoid work for a while longer, and in checking my new comments, find a second comment from someone named Marty, and as I’m wondering who this person is, I read the comment and find out that its my dad, using an alias, and I laugh, the first genuine – reflection-of- happiness laugh all day. And I think that today might turn out ok afterall.