Ancient barista rivals ancient mariner boring tale

The Tale of the Half-Empty Barista

All cups lead to “meh, I’ve had better”

There’s a story my co-workers go on and on about, at the coffee cart, about a half-empty barista with a tale to tell.

He sits across the street outside Starbucks, in his frayed barista bib, hoping to share his tale with any passer-by, who makes eye contact. He grabs their ear with his radio announcer's voice and grabs their hand with his sweaty shaky caffeinated palms.

He will sit there forever until someone brings him a doppio macchiato ristretto at 150 degrees. And until that day, he will tell his tale over and over again to whoever catches his caffeinated glittery eye. And he will not stop until someone buys him a cup of coffee.

And he don’t want no regular cup of joe either, ya hear? He would like “a doppio macchiato ristretto at 150 degrees, and please don’t hit your ass on the way in and please don’t spill any drink on the way out. And don’t carry the cup with your hands, use a napkin” cause he don’t know where your hands have been.

His story began when he moved from Seattle to Chicago, from a town where coffee was an art to a town where coffee made him fart. That’s when it all started to go bad.

It unhinged him. So he roamed the country, ordering this doppio macchiato ristretto at 150 degrees, to no avail. Regular folks in regular towns chased him out of town.

“I’ve never heard of that drink sir, but if you say that’s a cup of coffee, I say you’re either a communist or a foreigner and this country likes her coffee black or with flavored cream in a small plastic tub.”

He rode buses and trains and even planes to find the perfect doppio macchiato ristretto at 150 degrees, yearning for his old Seattle home where his drink was standard, expected, and never judged.

He told a barista in Montana, “I can’t even talk to anyone until I take a sip of my doppio macchiato ristretto at 150 degrees” and the fellow gave him a purple eye, a bloody lip, and a weak cup of coffee with mint-flavored cream.

In Texas, he told a barista, “I am not even a human without my coffee.” The ten-gallon hatter responded, “That’s how I feel about my gun” and shot the foam right off the tip of his drink, making it dollipless.

In Maine, as soon as he began his order, a pack of church moms, waiting to buy a box of coffee for a picnic, pointed at him and yelled, “Witch witch witch!” Until he was just too embarrassed to finish his real order, so he ordered a box of black coffee and left.

The Gods looked down in confusion. They felt like, “This dude has something to learn about being tone-deaf, and not being able to read a room, and learning about ‘when in Rome and shit.’ So they struck a lightning bolt in his general direction and turned him into an ancient mariner-style storyteller.

They actually thought he’d learn quicker. Put a man outside a Starbucks and make him tell a stupid story about not getting the kind of coffee he wanted, and after a day, he’ll be like “Jesus, that was dumb. Maybe I ought to lighten up a little about the specificity of my coffee and get on with my life.”

But the dude’s apparently been there for years, just telling his tale, trying to get someone to buy him a doppio macchiato ristretto at 150 degrees. So that’s the tale of the half-empty barista, who couldn’t appreciate a good cup of coffee if someone dumped it on his head, which happens at least once a day. So he’s annoying as hell, but he smells delicious.