o I’m sitting in the Banner Elk cafe, having my brew at 4200 feet. Interesting.

My home cafe in Florida (Framework, on 17-92) is my place. The black joe is strong (need water as a chaser) and the grinding in the back makes me sneeze sometimes, but that’s okay. It’s a younger clientele, a bunch of middle-twenties/early-thirties people, most of them using the cafe as an office (sitting at laptops, a cold cup of coffee untouced at their side). There is always some homeless guy there (they change out every two weeks or so) but they generally behave and a cool. The bulletin board by the rear entry is papered with indy bands and events I can’t even decode. The longtime baristas (Ryan and Morgan) give us a smile when we come in. If we can get it, we’ll take the front seat by the cracked window and watch all the good people of the world race about for work and errands.

The Banner Elk Cafe is night and day to this place. I came in and ordered coffee and a scone and sat by the window. I noticed some looks from the wait staff as they escorted other guests to their tables (what, you have to be walked to a specific table? What is this, Dennys?). And as far as art on the wall and postings on the cork board, none of that. The customers (two couples sharing a table and three women, all of them mountaintop people (i.e. moneybags from lofty Beach Mountain)) clearly enjoy slumming down here. They all have that familiar talking method, where someone starts to say something and someone else cuts them off, finishing the story or adding an observation. And both tables are talking so loud that they are both raising their voices to be heard, making the Elk a noisy damn place for enjoying a cup at a nationalized table and reading. Finally they left (each party getting into their huge FUV’s for the chugging climb back to the summit).

The only interesting thing was that one of the guys at the nearest table (the two couples) had been quiet the entire time. They interrupted each other about (of all things) airplane crashes and the resulting graphic deaths. Then the old guy closed out their set by telling a tale or two about working for FedEx in the early days. The stories made me smile – he talked about facing down Fred Smith and flying the original Falcon jets. I would have loved to mentioned that I only just retired from FedEx after twenty years but that would indicate I was listening in (I was (how could I not?)) so I let it go.

I guess you can read between the lines on which lifestyle I prefer. Sure, young people are noisy and PC-fixed but there is a vibrancy there (like in Coasters in Norfolk where I spent a nice morning with author Sarah Husch). I might be in the final decades of life, but laying in my pile of cash in Beach Mountain (or The Villages (especially not that)) is an admission of decline. I am still interested in busy life swirling about me.

So I’ll take my coffee black, and I’ll be deliberate where I take it.

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P.S. The wife found First Chair, about a mile from the house here. Great coffee, snacks, and you can sit wherever you wish. Coffee was good and the chocolate muffin fantastic. If I lived up here in Beach Mountain, this would be my choice.