Iced Coffee Glut

The delightfully easygoing Midwest man who recently became my ex-boyfriend did have a select few things that he liked to have just so: he ordered his Starbucks [whatever they call the medium size] coffee in a [whatever they call the large size] cup every day (presumably so it wouldn’t spill in the car on the way to work, although I never thought to ask why), and he always selected the baby four-tined Ikea fork from the drawer full of better, five-tined forks because he liked how its diminutive size made him feel like he was getting to eat more food.

I liked that he had at least a handful of preferences and needs like that, because I find it comforting to have things just so too—although for me this is the rule and not the exception. In the winters, when I lived in on East 10th Street and First Avenue, I walked up First in the mornings to get my coffee (large, light with skim, three Sweet-n-Lows) from the Dunkin’ Donuts at 12th Street, before I got to the L train at 14th. In the summers though, when it was nice enough to walk all the way to work (I am the rare freak for whom it can’t ever get too hot or too humid), I walked over to the Second Avenue Dunkin’ Donuts, and got the iced version of the light-with-skim-and-three-Sweet-n-Lows coffee. I took a lot of pleasure in my morning routine—as I think most people do—and I enjoyed the semiannual changing of the coffee seasons as just one part of the fun about changing seasons. New thinking, new attitude, new possibilities.

Here in L.A., as people like to say, there are no seasons. There is always only iced coffee. And I really love iced coffee, but what’s my motivation if I get to have it all the time? It’s so easy and comfy here; it’s a little bit freakish. Like how, if the two-liter bottles of Diet Coke are on sale for 10 for $10, I can buy 10 and just roll the shopping cart out to my car with all them in there, and then drive the car to my house, and then bring the sodas to the fridge, and the ones that don’t fit in the fridge can fit in any number of empty cabinets until I’m ready to drink them (which will be, like, tomorrow, because I drink a lot of Diet Coke). For me there is the illusion here that I don’t have to force myself to do great things because great things are not happening at a frenetic pace around me, taunting me. I’ve come to realize that this is indeed an illusion. And maybe it’s a relief of an illusion, compared to the pressure of New York (where people may not be doing things that are any greater than the things folks are doing here, but they’re breaking more of a sweat and being louder about it, while drinking and smoking more). I got complacent. Complacent—and legitimately happy too, in a comfortable, off-duty way that I haven’t enjoyed in a while (thank you, easygoing Midwestern man). Generally speaking, complacency may not be a bad thing, although I’m not sure yet.

Recently, when we were driving on Melrose, we passed something, some historic Hollywood landmark—I can’t remember what now—and I remarked to my Midwestern man that that was a place I used to go to in high school. And he said he thought it must have been very cool to grow up in L.A., as I did (he was brought up in Champaign, Illinois, and moved to L.A., as people do, to try to sell scripts). I guess it was cool, but it also corrupted me: it maybe stripped me of my ability to see for what it is the energy and vitality in this great city. Mostly I just feel like it's home.

Of course no one living in New York was actually from New York; that was what I understood. But I thought most of those folks were from L.A. It turns out, most folks aren’t really from L.A. either, but they came here in search of ambitious and good and beautiful things. That’s what I’m back here searching for too. Iced coffee and all.