I’ve worked in the coffee industry for about five years now, essentially the entire time I’ve lived in Arkansas. Since moving here I’ve learned more about this very interesting crop and the culture around it than I had realized there was to know, and I am aware that I have only scratched the surface of the deep and rich world of this international commodity. Though I can hold up my end of the conversation with the experts in the field, such interactions are most assuredly weighted more on the side of the other person. I live and work around a great number of people who take coffee very seriously, and really understand the potential of this marvelous little cherry pit — indeed, if you aren’t already aware, some of the best coffee companies in the world are located here in Northwest Arkansas. Here in NWA there are ample resources to learn brewing, roasting, serving, sourcing, growing, and every aspect of the industry that one could hope to be involved in. And while I am intrigued by all of this, I have come to recognize my place as being a bit different than many of those who work in this field. Because for me the best part of coffee has little to do with the bean, and everything to do with the people gathered around it.
In general, I am much more concerned about the philosophy behind a product than the product per se. Clothing, watches, jewelry, music, cars, even plants and food and drink — all of these things can be taken at face value and seen as nothing more than an end in themselves, and yet I believe they speak to something much deeper in all of us, something worth delving into and talking about. I could speak at length about any of the above mentioned topics (next time you see me, ask me about my watch), but today I’d specifically like to write about coffee, and what it means to me.
In the summer of 2017 I headed east with two of my dearest friends in hopes of getting lost in the forested mountains of Maine. I have fond memories of making camp, setting up a portable wood burning stove and setting my little red kettle on it to boil water for coffee. The coffee was from a supermarket, and was ground when I bought it. I scooped out an uncalculated amount into my metal mesh filter and dropped it into my mug for a few minutes. When I thought it was done I sat and sipped on it, looking round at the pine trees and needle-covered forest floor, my friends nearby and the sounds of the earth and sky drifting in and out of notice. It was quiet, not silent as an empty room with no windows, but quiet as the wind is quiet on a summer day in Maine.
In November of 2020, while much of the world was still reeling from a virus they’d been taught to fear, I found myself in Lawrence, Kansas with two young men I’d not known more than twenty-four hours, who were now my friends. We walked through the woods and stood along the shore of the lake. We huddled together in our tent and laughed until we slept. In the morning we ground up some beans from a local roaster and made coffee in a French press, and sat around the embers of the fire warming our hands and talking. If an angel had come down from the sky and seen us, they would never have guessed from that scene what was happening in the rest of the world. We were at peace.
Just a few days ago, I rose with the sun and my friends on a chilly morning, rose with the birds and dogs, rose with the memory of the rising of my Saviour. We stood around the fire built from yesterday’s ashes, and cooked bacon and eggs in a cast iron pan. I guessed at what looked to be around twenty grams of beans, ground them and tossed them into the bottom of my travel mug with some hot water, and came back to it some minutes later when I thought it would taste decent. It did. And it was enough.
Coffee for me isn’t about crafting the perfect cup. I can do the math, I can dial in a shot of espresso, and make a well balanced cup, I can pour a cappuccino with silky texture and rosy sweetness. But that isn’t what it’s about for me. It’s about experiences with people; it’s about the cup that’s stopped steaming because the conversation is just that good and you’ve forgotten all about it; it’s about vulnerable talks around a fire with people who you didn’t know were kindred hearts; it’s about making someone smile even when they don’t know the difference between a cortado and a latte, but they understand that they’re welcome in your shop. Coffee, like so much else, opens the door for love to walk in by enabling us to share of ourselves. The cost may be a few dollars, but the reward is not something to be counted with cash.
I think about these sorts of things fairly often, certainly more than I write about them. Every now and again, I’ll have an experience, a conversation, an interaction that brings something to the forefront of my mind, and makes me want to share these thoughts. A few days ago I had one such experience, stepping over a shallow stream to watch a friend make coffee on a log, while another friend grabbed some footage. Out there where you can hear the birds chatting and feel the wind is just about the best place that you can make a pour-over. Quint is on his own coffee journey, and it’s an inspiring one even from the little that he shared with me on that sunny afternoon. You can read more about it on his website. The photos I’ve included here are from that day, and are intended to give you a glimpse into one of those little adventures that remind me how much more than a drink coffee can be.
It is a hope of mine that in life I will not be merely a consumer, but a participant. Such a hope can be realized in the simple everyday habit of drinking a cup of coffee; not merely to consume, but to participate in the particulars of life — quiet, calm, conversation, morning sunlight, community. Slow down, take a breath, and choose to acknowledge that the things around you are more than an end: they are a means to a fuller and more beautiful life.
love,
— Joel
Geeky Things
Camera: Fuji X100V
Location: Coler Mountain Bike Preserve, Bentonville, AR
Notes: In terms of the images in this post, I shot them all in jpeg with my X100V and its native 23mm f/2 lens, mostly wide open but a few at f/4. I processed them a bit in Capture One to add grain and adjust exposure and crop on some. In and of themselves these aren’t among my favourite images, but going along with the theme of what I wrote above, they are a part of a larger story that I think holds a great deal more value. For those wondering about Quint’s coffee setup, he housed most of it using the Life of Basal Coffee Traveler, and the Coffee Kit by Pakt, which also supplied his kettle, weighed and timed the brew using Timemore’s Black Mirror scale, and ground the beans with the 1ZPresso X-Pro. The coffee he used was the Honduras Benjamin Paz SL-28 from Onyx Coffee Lab. Altogether, not a bad kit at all for being small enough to carry all over the world.