This is my first blog post and if you're interested you can view it, gifs and all, here.
https://www.magerediting.com/post/coffeelicious
Coffeelicious
If you’re self-employed like myself, you may enjoy the freedom of being your own boss. However, it causes for many issues, especially if you work from home. Writing can be lonely work as it is, throw in - sitting in your make shift office, which is actually just the dining room table with a dying plant on top of it – and it can feel even lonelier.
This is why, when I’ve been staring at the blank screen for what feels like an eternity, sometimes it’s necessary to change scenery, and find a coffee shop as my new office.
So here I am. As I write this, I sit in a quaint coffee shop being run by a short Indian man, where Greek music plays. The tables are also covered in print that says Columbia. Is this place confused or genius? I’m not sure.
With impeccable timing, a woman was just asked if she’d like ketchup or mayonnaise to go with her small quiche with salad. Confused it is.
Yes, being self-employed is a world of its own, let alone being a self-employed artist. No day is the same, yet they all seem to manage to merge themselves into a colourful blur.
A lot of people ask me: how do you not get bored working from home? How do you get the motivation and inspiration to write?
Honestly, coffee shops. Lots of different coffee shops. There are other methods too of course, which we will explore over time in this blog, but changing my environment is one of the easiest ways to get the cogs to turn. Looking at the same four walls can just numb the creative brain; and instead bring a world of emptiness, frustration and yet… distraction. How many times have my fellow self-employed workers given in to the TV and found themselves caring about whether some toothless guy is, or isn’t, the father of a teenager girl’s baby? Admit it. More than once.
How many times have we watched the two rival cats on the fence have an hour-long stand-off, just in case it turns into something more severe? Again, more than once. But, the good news is, today I have run away from the TV, away from the garden fence, and I am in a coffee shop that even has Wi-Fi… wonderful (so that I can check my emails of course).
Oh…. Oh, my dear people.
The password is Vietnam2018....
And I thought coffee shops risked being a boring topic…
Coffee shops provide their own dilemmas, their own distractions. People watching, food, in this case the strange décor and aesthetic (the Greek music has now swapped to the Gypsy Kings…. Of course it has).
This month I shall explore many oddities I have encountered, just by working in these wonderful places. Perhaps you have overheard bizarre conversations, or seen members of the general public that look like they've jumped out of a story book. I know I have, and I cant wait to share some of those moments with you as the weeks tick by. For now, while I try and get on with my working day - I shall just leave you with the image of the Indian man, trying to nonchalantly learn how to do the 'floss' dance when he thinks I'm not looking.
You can get ideas for characters and plotlines by being in a coffee shop. Nevertheless, being at home alone is bliss. There will be no incessant talkers (at least for the time you are alone), or if you have someone like that in your family, or someone particularly poisonous whose very presence sucks the energy from the room. Substitute 'Solitude' for 'Loneliness'.
Hi Amy. I once did this at a holiday camp in Cornwall. Sitting in the family bar I watched certain people, what they did, how they acted and how the person they were with reacted. One man said something to his wife, who was struggling with the children, then he walked across to the bar and spoke to another woman. PING! And there it was my over active imagination straight into the big question 'Who is the other woman?' I think places that have lots of people around are always stories waiting to be written.