Sometimes it wakes you up like an alarm clock that has done its job too well, other times it comforts you like an old friend who always knows when to show up. And then, let's face it, we often use coffee as an excuse: for an interview, for a date, to avoid saying “let's just meet up”. It's a bridge, an aromatic alibi.
I order an espresso because... well, what else should I order? It's small, strong, reassuring. A bit like those phrases you say when you're trying to break the ice, but it does it better: it breaks your eyelids.
I sit down at the table with my coffee and I already know what's going to happen. Because coffee isn't just a drink: it's a ritual. It puts you in the right frame of mind, prepares you for light conversation, for useless but necessary questions, for observing the world with a slightly raised eyebrow.
There's a strange feeling in your stomach, that bittersweet feeling that only coffee can give you. Sweet because it promises company and a little clarity, bitter because when it's over you always want another one — and you never know if that's a good idea.
I find myself reflecting on the fact that the gesture of bringing the cup to your lips is a small daily choreography. A perfect, almost poetic movement, repeated millions of times by strangers everywhere. Yet every sip seems to say something different.
Coffee speaks, and how it speaks. It asks you: ‘How far do you want to go today?’ It's coffee that triggers that question in your head: where is the limit? How many coffees can I drink before I start asking overly philosophical questions? Before I start feeling like a character in a French film reflecting on the meaning of life while staring at the bottom of my cup?
I try to remain rational, but every sip draws you into a somewhat fairy-tale world, where even the barista seems like an omniscient narrator and the teaspoon has its own role in the plot. And as time passes — tick tock, tick tock — between empty cups and the laughter of the baby at the next table, you almost wish the coffee would never end.
But then it ends. It always ends. And at the bottom remains that hint of sadness, that microscopic melancholy that every good espresso leaves behind: the promise of a small but intense wonder that vanishes too soon.
I look at the empty cup. I ask myself once again: where is the limit? Perhaps there isn't one. Or perhaps it coincides exactly with that moment when you realise that the only way to overcome it... is to order another coffee.