A cold wind blew on the morning I chose to write like Ernest Hemingway. It pressed against my chest as I walked from the back of my house to the open garage and knew that it was not a day for spending time outdoors without a jacket. It was a wet, heavy cold and I felt it in my chest and cursed myself because I’d foolishly left my jacket hanging on an empty chair at the Café Divine, the very place where I intended to work. The jacket had been reasonably priced but was very well-made, with fleece lining and a reinforced corduroy collar. But these qualities offered little reinforcement against the wet wind when I was not actually wearing it.
I turned on the seat warmer in my car, a comfortable and reliable Buick, and drove to Café Divine to retrieve my jacket and, with luck, to write in the manner of Hemingway. I drove to the café in all types of weather, though it was always best when the wind was not wet and cold. The café was a pleasant place, with strong coffee and crusty scones, and I could often work there without interruption, and without having to be unkind to interrupters who didn’t observe café protocol.
The manager was a sturdy woman with farmer’s hands and a meaty smell. She was in the business of being kind and had always been kind to me and very fair. But she too despised the interrupters and would chase them off even before they could reach my table. So I rarely had to stop working or to be unkind to them. I was thankful for this, for my temper has always been short with those who fail to observe café protocol, or with those who are too ignorant to realize that protocols exist.
The manager was well versed in café protocol, and she guarded her establishment with the ferocity of a police dog. I often marveled at her sense of things, how she seemed to intuit who the interrupters were. And I could never fathom how she always knew just when they were about to pounce on a writer at work. But she always did, and it was quite a thing to see.
As I drove into the wind that day, I resolved to ask the café manager about her hunter’s sense for interrupters. But when I arrived, I discovered that she no longer worked there. She had returned to the solitude of her farm, where she could tend to her smokehouse in peace and not be troubled with café protocol, Hemingway impersonators, or the business of being kind.
Rick Brown Writes 