Good Coffee Brews Good Conversation

Good coffee brews good conversation.

At Goodbye Blue Monday Coffeehouse, middle-aged women strike up a conversation about hot NPR topics. St. Olaf and Carleton students exchange interesting references to Jesus Christ as they chat about their academic struggles. Teenagers talk about young love and heartbreak. College-aged “bros” (alpha males who are a few yards short of a touchdown) share weekend warrior tales. A Northfield Patch intern analyzes the local population for potential social commentary regarding an insightful conversation that she previously had with her media studies professor …

I know that last example has nothing to do with artful conversation. I just don’t have it in me to come up with clever transitions today.

So ...

My point: face-to-face conversations are alive and well here in Northfield. We should even change our city’s motto to “Cows, Colleges, Contentment, and Conversation.”

No, no we should not. It is already embarrassing to live in a city with our motto as is when you are a pseudo-bohemian intellectual like myself.

Oh, yes. My real point, which is muddied with more sarcasm and sass. Despite the smells of coffee breath lingering in my nostrils with all of this conversing, I am still troubled by the lack of quality that these conversations embody. Sure, people are chatting with one another. However, iPhones are being cradled, one earbud remains intact at all times, hipster music is blasting, and that couple cannot possibly being sharing eye contact with that glaringly bright computer screen in between them.

Can good coffee brew good conversation any longer? I think it’s a lost art. Oh, woe is me.

Signed,
A Social Media Junkie and a Hypocrite