Ashbury's Coffeehouse is hipster fodder: secondhand furniture,
soy milk, and ersatz antiques occupy every corner, the clutter
reminiscent of my grandmother's apartment. The air is perfumed
by fresh-old coffee and musk, an overall dank quality comforting
when I sink into one of the many mismatched armchairs. I was
never fond of the occupants or the service; everyone has a
laptop and a thick layer of pretension. They're art students,
mostly; I catch snippets of their conversation, their
discussions of religion and politics and fashion. They laugh,
cite bullshit statistics, and smile with teeth they never
bothered to fix. Hollywood wants them to be beautiful, but they
are instead quaint. They look and act like figurines the same
grandmother keeps in tall cabinets: stiff-jointed, dressed to
the nines, and performing in a pattern, wound-up and replayed.
My loathing is tempered by curiosity. The espresso is subpar,
nothing a Starbucks couldn't provide me. It's a bit cheaper but
set remotely; the price of gas more