the japanese cafè (Part 1, Chapter 1)

Part 1

Chapter 1

worries overshadow happiness

The café, was small in size, there was minimal space to allow for a few small tables, chairs and a wall clock. There were no lights inside, the only source of light were the windows, which let the whole interior light up. It is also fair to specify that this café was located in a very quiet area of a densely populated city. The building was brick on the outside but the inside of the café had a totally different style. In fact, the walls were colored green and the floor was a simple dark wooden parque. The only two clerks were a man (tall and muscular with a short beard and long dark hair) and a woman (with long straight dark hair and almond-colored eyes). When someone entered the shop, because of a small bell placed above the door, a slight ringing could be heard. One day a man entered. From his facial expression it was logical to understand that he was a poor city clerk, exhausted by life in the big metropolis. 

“A coffee,” he said after sitting on the stool in front of the counter, and a coffee was immediately brought to him.

“What brings you to want coffee,” the barista asked him.

“I'm tired ... and I need energy if I want to get through the day.”

“I'm sorry, if you want you can vent to me” and smiled at him.

As the barista delicately dried a glass using a beautiful embroidered white tablecloth the man said

“I want to talk” Brief silence, then the answer

“Tell me!”

“My wife left me for a moron, she said I was working too hard and should devote more to the family...that's not true, I was dedicated to the family, but I also had to raise money for this family to live no? On the other hand, I was from morning to night in the office answering e-mails and phone calls...I missed the air you feel when you have no thoughts, when you realize you're peaceful and doing a job you like...but I can't go back now. I went through a difficult time financially and took out loans from many banks to which I now have to pay back twice as much...I'm tired...I wish I had never been born so I wouldn't have let my children grow up without a father.”

The bartender takes a breath and closes his eyes, takes a medallion from his pocket and looks at it, then begins to speak as he looks at the object

“You see sir, every day many people come here for coffee, and in no face have I seen joy...now...do you see that little table at the side of the room? Two girls are sitting there.... You imagine that those are your two daughters.... You see how they smile and how joyful they are, you could be like them, with or without worries... how? Worry about what is present and alive! What is troubling you is not a valid thing to live badly, it is not! Go to your children, to your wife, give them a hug and count every second of that hug, don't miss one and above all look for for joy in that hug! Everything will be fine sir, everything will be fine.”

Having said this the man, already in tears leaves the cost of coffee on the counter and runs for the exit.... The barista, who recognizes that he has brought him to his senses smiles, places the medallion in his pocket and says to his colleague

“He was not an evil man, nor was he crazy, he just has to look for happiness in the smallest things...and having done that he will begin to live.”

The colleague also smiled and then turned and continued to dry the glasses.