“Here is your change”
“Here is your change”
watching a stranger perform their life by Tara Giddings
(yes, some magazine writing assignments are a little strange)
I notice a tattoo of an open hand is inscribed on her forearm as she hands me my change. A hand open to life, open to a job of offering things to others, or open to interpretation by the stranger watching her work at the coffee shop in San Francisco's Marina district as she serves the tech industry elite and their wives who just finished their first yoga class of the day. She looks down and laughs at something a coworker says, the kind of gesture that someone would fall in love with, a behind the scenes look into her mind. She looks down in focus as she steams milk and carefully carries coffee outside just so a customer can sit with his fluffy golden best friend. She carries pasties in a nonchalant manner, the way people do when they have done something a million times and no longer think about it. She talks quietly with customers who glance up at her face just quickly enough to briefly describe her, blue eyes, brown hair, a silver band in her nose setting her apart from the wealthy women wearing lululemon. “Pretty Woman” plays on the radio and she looks around the cafe, doing her job, probably not paying attention to the sound as she attends to a father's needs with a kind smile and gentle laugh. Everyone's a pretty woman to someone right? She stands out as much as she blends in. Stands out in the sea of people who expect their eggs and toast to magically appear before them, blends into the vaguely artistic faux European coffee shop as just another vaguely artistic girl in a coffee shop. Because she is a girl, she is someone working for herself, she is more independent than any of the people around her and yet here she is serving them oh so kindly.
watching a stranger perform their life by Tara Giddings
(yes, some magazine writing assignments are a little strange)
I notice a tattoo of an open hand is inscribed on her forearm as she hands me my change. A hand open to life, open to a job of offering things to others, or open to interpretation by the stranger watching her work at the coffee shop in San Francisco's Marina district as she serves the tech industry elite and their wives who just finished their first yoga class of the day. She looks down and laughs at something a coworker says, the kind of gesture that someone would fall in love with, a behind the scenes look into her mind. She looks down in focus as she steams milk and carefully carries coffee outside just so a customer can sit with his fluffy golden best friend. She carries pasties in a nonchalant manner, the way people do when they have done something a million times and no longer think about it. She talks quietly with customers who glance up at her face just quickly enough to briefly describe her, blue eyes, brown hair, a silver band in her nose setting her apart from the wealthy women wearing lululemon. “Pretty Woman” plays on the radio and she looks around the cafe, doing her job, probably not paying attention to the sound as she attends to a father's needs with a kind smile and gentle laugh. Everyone's a pretty woman to someone right? She stands out as much as she blends in. Stands out in the sea of people who expect their eggs and toast to magically appear before them, blends into the vaguely artistic faux European coffee shop as just another vaguely artistic girl in a coffee shop. Because she is a girl, she is someone working for herself, she is more independent than any of the people around her and yet here she is serving them oh so kindly.
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