I sincerely believe that everybody needs a few of those hide-out, hang-out places, where you can just be yourself, basically chill-out and never feel like getting up and leaving, some place that gives a homely feeling while you're away from home! Maybe i'm just a hopeless dreamer, or maybe its the affect of growing up watching "Friends" have their coffee at the Central Perk, but lately, the one place where I feel absolutely relaxed is a tiny little coffee place around the corner called Lino's Coffee.
My Monday mornings usually start with a hot cup of coffee at this cozy little café. Since no one's really crazy enough to wake up half an hour earlier on a Monday, just to have forty minutes of coffee-time...specially not in Italy, where the concept of a coffee is generally like a shot of concentrated "wake-up" caffeine which is gulped down in precisely 10 seconds...mornings are a quiet time, and I'm often the only ( crazy might I add...) customer at this hour. Of course, it starts filling up as soon as I enter...maybe I just add to the attraction....ha..in my dreams!..anyway...but its relatively quiet anyway. So I enter and usually find the comfy sofa in the corner near the entrance to place myself. I love this little corner of the shop, since I feel like I'm in my own private little corner, and can look out through the class walls of the café, and observe the morning buzz of the university surroundings. Then I go order my coffee, which by the way, is not an easy task. This place has like a million ( remember...i exaggerate..!) different types of coffee, and its quite a challenge to decide which one to take! Anyway, once i make my deliberated choice, I go to the bar counter and watch them make it. I'm even more enthusiastic about watching this process when there's the cute-coffee-guy behind the counter..hehe. Well anyway, after ogling at the cutie ( ...i *will* ask his name someday...), I take my coffee and go sit in my little corner. And then...I just sit...and watch.
Its amazing how relaxed one can feel with a coffee in hand and nothing to do! I look outside and watch people rush past ( yes...everyone's always late on Monday mornings!), I watch cars zip by, trams roll along and the typical 10 am hurry. I watch people come in the shop, chit-chat, then go off again. And this is one of the only times of the day, when I feel absolutely removed from the rush, when I can actually just sit back, settled into the cushioned sofa and enjoy people hurry along, while I take my time and enjoy sipping my creamy frothy coffee . I daze off and think about all I have to do that day, that week, that month, that year..(er... you get the picture) and surprisingly, don't get stressed and worked up or worried ( umm yes...usually thinking about the future is the perfect jerk that gets my nerves go all jittery and out of control!). I go into my own lost world of meandering wanderings, and sway into the clouded reveries of my idle mind.
Then, I'm usually snapped back to reality when a friend ( or friends...depending on who I can con into waking up early and meet me at Lino's) comes and stands in front of me, reminding me, oh i'm in a coffee place, but I actually have to get up and go to class which is in 15 minutes! So wearily, I get up and get my things, and get ready to walk out...but not without a last glance back at my lovely hide-out ( and uhm...looking to catch the cutie's eye while saying Ciao!) and close the glass door behind me...to begin another new day, with the same old crap!
