21 Comments

I feel like you take me with you when describe the comfortable surroundings where you

get your creative juices flowing!

“Jazz on the radio”

“Scatter of mismatched tables”

I’ll keep coming with you as long as the poet within keeps creating 🤗

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Glad to meet you there, Looocinda!❤️

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Wonderful storytelling in this one. And a beautiful ode to 'Third Places' all over the world. I don't have one at the moment, but this poem reminded me of the ones I had in the previous places I lived in. Thank you.

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I hope you find one again soon, Arjan. Thanks for reading. ❤️

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At the moment, I'm fine. Managed to organise my surroundings differently. But if I move again, I will certainly look for a new place.

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So nicely done! I want to be searching my brain at a table across the room while gazing at that Paris street scene. I was lucky to have a small breakfast and lunch cafe near me for a while. One was welcome to just have cinnamon toast and latte or a gooey bun and herbal tea while waking up to start the day. A few pieced of local art on the walls gave one something to ponder. Such places are a kind of human treasure. Thank you for reminding me of that. Do love your writing!

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Thank you so much, Sandy. I agree, cafes are one of the things that humans get right, a way we welcome and make space for each other. All that and cinnamon toast, too!

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I love coffee shops! As a student I loved to study in them. The rural town I live in has very few, none close enough to easily walk to and there the added difficulty that I know everyone who comes in and they want to catch up - so I no longer work in coffee shops🥲

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The coffee shop experience in cities and little towns is 'way different, for a fact! ☕Thanks for reading, Donna.

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I finally got caught up on reading the poems you sent for the last month, since when I was away there was not time to enjoy them--and here is another good one! Best wishes for happy writing at home and at your home away from home in the new year! Thanks for sharing, Rose

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Welcome back, Rose! Thanks for reading, and for your good wishes. ❤️

(We need to compare Christmas-with-sisters notes soon...! )

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“….close the rite that ends the day.”

Lovely turn of phrase.

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I had to search and search to find that last line! I like it now, and I'm glad you do as well.

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Jan 17, 2024
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Thanks so much, Maureen!

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That was so enjoyable and very likely only ten million of us feel the same way. There are days when I just want to wander around with my notebook. I lost it or can't find it. I was fond of it because some kind of different creativity comes from pen/pencil and paper. Keyboard is okay but not the same.

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Oh, I hope you find your notebook, Wes, or start another one! 'Way more portable than almost any keyboard, and you're right, there's something about engaging the writing muscles that also engages creativity in a different way. All my poems start their life in longhand.

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We are likely the last generation to have that connection with the tactile nature of writing. It's all keyboard now.

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How idyllic! And now I want to visit!

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You are always welcome at Cafe Bienvenue, Kim! :-)

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My husband is a devotee of one of our local coffee shops. I am entirely too distractible to get anything other than talking accomplished there. Which, come to think of it, is all he accomplishes there himself. 😊 Then again, maybe talking is where most everything begins.

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Talking is another excellent function of coffee shops! I do that, too, at Bienvenue, when friends and I meet there by appointment. When I go there by myself I rarely I see anyone I know better than to nod to, and other people chatting among themselves acts like "white noise" for me when I'm busy with my notebook. (With a few exceptions! Just every now and then there's a family with an extra-squeaky toddler or some guy with a loud voice and obnoxious politics, and I'm better off leaving before I make a scene. That's rare, though.)

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