March 07, 2024 | FEATURES | By Anya Jones
At Colorado College, the weekend is a much-needed respite from the high-speed bullet train of a week on the Block Plan. It is two days and two nights of an eclectic mixture of stress, hope, ecstasy, deflation, piercing headaches and bizarre flight patterns. Some things you may see include hockey games featuring shirts somehow smaller than the towels the arena hands out, couples stumbling out of darties earlier than intended with their arms wrapped tenderly around each other, and lacrosse house firing off literal fireworks at 10:15 p.m. For some, the weekend is a time to sleep and spend 10 hours in the library. For others, it’s a time to adventure into the deep valley of the wonderous buildings east of Nevada St.
For the three women over the age of 53 at Poor Richard’s, it was a time to sit and gossip over a glass of 3 p.m. wine.
At first, I thought I was seated next to a woman with an exceptional tolerance for drinking alone. She sat comfortably and quietly with a full glass of red wine. She sat as such for about 10 minutes. It was at this very moment that two more women waddled over to her and, with an immense sigh, apologized profusely: “I am so sorry. The one time my family is talking…”
And so, it began.
It became immediately evident that these women had a lot to debrief. The topic of interest for today’s particular session: family problems. It started with a story about a friend. One of our women, let’s call her Beverly, had just come back from visiting a friend in some other arguably dumpy place, perhaps Oklahoma or North Texas – I missed that part – and she was commenting on the tumultuous relationship between the friend-from-dumpy-place and that friend’s sister; they didn’t speak to each other. This radio silence followed the death of their mother, who passed away from cancer. Beverly explained that her friend’s home was covered in pictures and memorabilia of their deceased mother, which she said was “really, really weird.”
Beverly, quickly tired of talking about other people, wanted to talk about herself, and so it commenced: “I have a family like that.” She meant that she doesn’t speak to her siblings. Beverly has a complicated relationship with her brother and her mother. Ostensibly, her friends understood these complications because she did not elaborate on the causes of said complications. She did, however, jump to the meat of her story, which was a tension-filled reunion to discuss important matters with her estranged family members.
Beverly set the scene for her friends. She explained how she knew she needed a specific location, where she couldn’t be yelled at or made to feel guilty. This necessitated a public space of some sort. She also explained the importance of food — a much appreciated way to distract stressed hands. “I just needed something neutral … so, we went to Chick-fil-A.” When I tell you I balked. Never have I ever heard Chick-fil-A described as a “neutral location.” Neutral locations to me are park benches and street corners. Chick-fil-A is where you go when you’re half-asleep or feeling sacrilegious. Beverly, however, was certainly proud of this selection. She said “Chick-fil-A” with such conviction, like she had just solved the New York Times crossword questions.
I didn’t hear what the content of their conversation was. I, unfortunately, had to depart right at the climax. But I was inspired to return to the fascinating amalgamation that forms in the sanctuary of a cafe. So, on Sunday morning, I found myself in Loyal Coffee, which attracts, as you can imagine, a very different crowd from our local Poor Richard’s. With its light wood interior and piles of sourdough bread, it is a haven for that type of person. I enjoyed a revolving door of mothers with cat-eye sunglasses and their stylish children, a loud Scottish woman, a young man drawing the shoes of the woman sitting in front of him, and lots of readers.
As gospel-style R&B music blared, it struck me just how diverse Colorado Springs can be. Within just a few blocks, it is completely possible to have a young man in cargo pants showing a middle-aged couple a ski edit on YouTube and a woman who fervently believes in the neutrality of Chick-fil-A to coexist. It’s certainly an odd place here. A million little bubbles – each building on campus, each house off-campus, each cafe downtown, each block up north. It’s both beautiful and disconcerting. I love to hate it, but I hate to love it.