Just a Regular Joe
Steeped in the brew of American individuality, where we prioritize and commodify uniqueness, there is a certain comfort that draws us in and away. Whether conscious or not we are chasing being… regular. Our commute, our breakfast, our bowels- one tick towards the irregular dial sets us off. We blare on our horn, we’re hangry, we text our friends photos: “is this normal?” hoping we can get back on the train of predictability.
Of course it’s what we crave. While as a proud Aquarius I taut that I’m “not like other girls” with minimal irony, I still seek the comfort of consistency. It’s incredibly dysregulating to catalog so many mundane tasks- we have to optimize our energy by cutting out the miscellaneous.
Comprehending the regular pace of day to day gives us a sense of control, a sense of understanding that the world isn’t just happening to us, but we exist within her terrarium and have agency. It’s a part of adulthood I’ve come to cherish. Directing energy towards what I want my attention on, including the smaller moments that stitch together a life. The meals, the laughs, the coffees- it’s nice to enjoy the “little” life. With millions of micro decisions it is difficult to exercise that control we crave, so we find ritual within it. Even the least religious rituals can feel sacred and untouchable. A standard we’ve created seeping into a source of identity and a way we understand the world from within our own mind.
So, we look for rituals within our identities, and identify with what becomes our rituals. The two become so intrinsically linked it curates a bubble of community around us.
Nothing can take that away, right?
When “the new normal” became our new normal, we were stripped bare. We all lost a sense of ourselves. Foundations we built our life off became extinct. And with extinction meant it was time for a new definition of life.
Now I’d like to take a moment to apologize for bringing that heinous phrase back into your mind. There was no other pairing of words that could quite make my blood boil. “The New Normal” was my “moist.” I cringed at the mere utterance of it. It was a logical fallacy. Yes, the world is “unprecedented,” but that doesn’t mean we won't get back to before. This will all happen, we will have an end, and then, boom reset, we will continue on right where we left off. The epilogue will not usher in, this is just a commercial break. Then that year came to an end.
And still the largest sense of community was found as a myriad of tiles of faces on a screen. Sure, you can tell me these are my friends, but this doesn’t quite feel like friendship. Our perception of interconnectedness through technology has created an inverse effect by increasing the need for community while masquerading as satiating that need. A problem our “new normal” has accelerated. We are in a loneliness epidemic in an age when we’ve never had more immediate access to interpersonal communication.
So what have we done to change? Not much, honestly. Initiatives are ineffective and not implemented at the exponential rate of technological development that we need to keep up. We can never get back to where we were before. This is not one extended Apple ad break. This is the same movie, and it’s going to keep playing. Our new normal.
Now I know I am not the first to comment on this. Plenty of journalists and armchair experts have pontificated on how technology and social media are the end of human connection. That is not a new take. Touché. But amongst the ways modern society is pulling us apart I’ve seen subconscious remedies towards community that brings hope.
I moved home to Asheville, NC to wait out the societal commercial break. There, I joined my parents’ nightly tradition of trudging through another classic American sitcom. Often I was unethused and decided doom scrolling in my room was the better option. However, there was something about the bar where “everybody knows your name” that had me standing, engrossed, in the middle of the living room. And stand I would for hours though I swore I was just passing through. Maybe it was young Woody Harrelson or Ted Danson’s charm, or how shocking it was to see the tooth fairy be a normal person, but eventually, I exchanged my stand for a permanent sit. The humor was quippy, the film grain nostalgic, yet the true nostalgia of these friends laughing at a bar is what kept me seated. It was something I was longing to do again. I had never been into a bar like that before. Having only been able to legally drink for a couple years, I was limited to bars who were pretty fed up with the college clientele and my soft voice often lost battles amongst a pounding bass. You gotta go where everybody knows your name. I wanted to, but these were the third spaces late stage capitalism has resigned us to. A place to partake in the economy, together.
Days started to look really the same. Waking up and falling asleep within the same four walls, sitting at my desk overlooking the window, understanding that technically there is a world to be living out there. Technically. Through that window I saw leaves die and bloom again. I could see the change but only felt stagnant. You can’t comprehend changes you observe everyday. I was living in a ritual, but not of my choosing.
I had to escape into something. Some sort of quantifiable change. Anything sounded nice since my entire world population was three adults and two dogs. So I got a job at the local specialty coffee shop. It was always something I wanted to do. I quickly got to know the packs of regulars: visual artists whose studios shared the neighborhood with our small cafe, neighboring chefs we traded meals with, and others seeking a familiar face. It was a true community. It felt like a home. This was a bar where everybody knew your name. And I saw time and time again the subtle jubilation when I would use a regular’s name for the first time. Everyone was so desperate to be seen.
A regular. It’s a badge of honor to be recognized by your bartender or barista. It shows you’ve made a good enough impression to be recognized within the revolving door of faces they see daily. But it’s not just being seen, it’s being known, even if it is in something as trivial as your milk preference. This badge of honor isn’t something you can achieve, it must be bestowed. Sure, you could buy the same black iced coffee at the same time everyday for two years, but it isn’t until we adopt you into our ecosystem that you become fully actualized. “The wand chooses the wizard, Mr Potter”- the barista chooses the regular.
There’s a certain intimacy that can’t be replicated in other relationships. These are people who see each other more frequently than their closest friends. Much intention and planning goes into all relationships, but this kind is born out of a break. Within these microscopic moments between all the things we’re supposed to be doing, we have a chance at a breath. A chance at communion with another human- a human who has a whole myriad of hopes and needs and losses and passions and you may never know any of them. But in this moment we can accept just being known. Even if it’s just our order.
I recently finished a very late to the game binge of The Last of Us. In the finale, as our two leads approach the end of their impossible journey of battling bad of all variations of sentience, they hypothesize about what comes next. Their life had been a series of reactions, and now they dream about initiating action. I had never related more to a pair of zombie killers in my life. Sure, the series is addicting because of its seamlessly crafted arc hedging on intense action and carefully timed bait and switches. However, what draws the audience in is Joel and Ellie’s once performative turned earnest reliability on each other. Security in knowing they have each other’s back. Their regularity in each other’s lives amongst an unprecedented world. It’s what we’re all looking for- somebody to know our name.
Legacy is rarely considered by us younger generations. As the test of time looms on in our souls we may begin to question what we want to leave behind. Something to be remembered by. But maybe the legacy we leave is matching us while we’re living. Less about reminding others that we were here, and more reminding ourselves that we are here. Taking a break from the continuity of our lives, holding something warm in our hands, conversing with a stranger, and feeling the energy permeate between us. Maybe caffeine was never the energy we were chasing.
Single Origin Sonder explores the curiosities of humanity from the lens of professional people watcher. Coming to you live just in time for your Sunday morning coffee.