Chocolate Interruptus

Tuesday afternoon calls for hot chocolate, extra hot, without the toxic gunk of cream and
marshmallows spooned on top that the café chalkboard on the wall calls luxury. Patrick, the guy behind the bar, brings it to the table and I stop reading for a while to warm my hands on the hot mug and let the bitter café smell of coffee grinds swirl around my mind as it mixes with the steam from the rich, milky drink and rises towards a slightly open window, escaping into the brittle cold that holds the city in a tight, frozen grip. Banks of clouds are piling up on top of each other outside in the heavy, mobile sky, a dazzling array of hundreds of shades of grey.
  
I don’t resent the man sitting three tables away while I drink my steaming great mug of hot chocolate. I don’t resent him and I’m not angry with him, but I do wish he would shut up. He’s filling the quiet, mellow warmth of Michael’s with protracted bursts of introspection that he propels at the top of his gravelly voice in the direction of his friend, table partner or whoever the man is that sits opposite.

I try not to listen. The friend interjects from time to time when he gets the opportunity at a volume inaudible from where I sit, trying, I suspect, to indicate that there is no need to shout without actually saying so, perhaps trying to model good café etiquette, but the shouter remains oblivious. He seems a bit embarrassed, the friend. Perhaps he’s trying to be positive by being thankful that the topic of discourse in nothing more intimate than data handling research which is the topic of the shouter’s PhD.

Should he continue in that field; does he have anything original to offer; how do people feel about his wife’s area of expertise being more relevant than his?

The friend drains his coffee cup and puts it on the table with an air of finality, tidying up crumbs and putting them on his saucer as an indication that the session is now at an end. He reaches for his coat, wraps his scarf around his neck, keeps looking for a gap in the conversation to excuse himself, but the more cues he sends out the louder the shouter shouts as he gets into his stride. The friend looks at his phone, obviously willing it to ring. I wish I had his number so that I could help him out, tell him he was needed elsewhere, and pretend to be his wife just gone into labour.

Patrick behind the bar comes over at last and asks the friends if they want re-fills. The listener grabs his chance and shouts “No!” a bit too emphatically. The shouter looks shocked but still never guesses the reason for such an adamant refusal.

They leave. The mellow warmth that the noise has displaced re-occupied Michael’s. All is quiet except for the acceptable, even necessary, dull concert of café sounds – the swoosh of steam forced from a machine, the clink of cups on saucers, the dull hubbub of private conversations and the odd bang from the kitchen.

I nod over to Patrick. In a few moments he brings me another mug of hot chocolate and I give myself to the rest of the afternoon.

Morning has broken over Belfast.

A blue, empty Monday has just run its splayed, frigid fingers over the houses and streets of Belfast to summon the citizens out of slumber. The sun's rays bolted across the sky as soon as it levered itself up from behind the Craigantlet hills, and they pierced through the smeared pigeon poop on my bedroom window to embed themselves in my eyes like grit.

So I'm out of bed. The garden is  cool and dew-soaked, giving itself to any green fingered amateur who would care to wield the spade, rake or trowel that have been left strewn wantonly around the lawn, but it's too early for me to succumb to that temptation just yet; I'll take up the challenge later, but I have to indulge myself in the beauty of freezing cold water spurting from the shower in the bathroom. I must drink tea and keep thinking as far away as possible from my brain before letting it gradually encroach into this precious moment of irresponsibility
.

Out by Raghly

It's still early, only 9.30, but I've already been in the sea out by Raghly this morning. I left the house quietly just when the dawn light was prising open the night's cover of malevolent looking black clouds to reveal the pale milkiness above.

I cycled on out the empty road and enjoyed feeling the burn in the muscles of my legs as they started to heat up. It was bitterly cold at first but I rode through the trees and soon felt the warmth of their damp, rotting leaves that keeps the heat on the ground.

The harbour was deserted; there wasn't even anyone there to walk their dog. I left my bike against the wall and walked on over the field to the long beach and just kept going till I got to the rocks that hide the stretch of sand where I like to play on empty mornings like this.

Acres of clean, pale, smooth sand, acres of neutral sky and the sun waiting just beyond the horizon before making her entrance and painting the drab landscape with her colours.

I took the satisfying, agonising plunge and swam out as far as I knew was safe then back again and when I walked, wet and wakened back to the rocks, that was when the sun made her grand appearance, spilling yellow light over the beach and the fields and blessing my wet, energised body with new peace and confidence while I stood drying in the breeze that was coming off the sea and the vague warmth of the sun’s rays.

I got dressed and left to cycle home. Back at the house and with the taste of the sea still in my mouth, I hung washing on the line that I had put in the washing machine before I went out. I made tea and took it into the garden and only then did members of the family start to struggle out of bed and join the day, oblivious to what they'd missed.