The hipster coffee place is usually perfumed with the scent of coffee beans roasted dark, and ground into submission, their effusive presence hanging in the air. But today I smell a crisp, cold beer, the scent of golden hops ushering in a childhood memory. The Espresso machine’s hissing and steaming melody draws in the caffeine indulged crowd, populating the cozy corners chatting away. Every breath of this building and its customers screams “pour-over”, no Dunkin’ here. Coffee art and the artsy crowd.

Sitting next to me is a gentleman of a mature age wearing a washed out Hilton Head t-shirt and khaki shorts, his tanned feet resting comfortably in sandals.  He embodies summer vacation and a relaxed, easy style.  His Ralph Lauren look bespeaks a different reality from what I perceive as his renegade underbelly. He is quite certainly an outlaw and a rebel. Breaking from the coffee folk, he sat down at his little rough hewn wooden table next to mine, his revolutionary persona proudly displayed through his choice of beverage, a cold beer in a frosted glass. He is an outlier, a defyer of coffee convention. You do realize that the foods we consume and the beverages we partake of speak volumes about who we perceive ourselves to be. Why is this coffee place populated with artists, musicians, and beautifully trendy and hip people? All the while Dunkin’ Donuts has a few old guys with Velcro closure walking shoes, and pants with elastic stretch waistbands? Why? Because paying $4.50 for a “pour-over” specially sourced coffee that was hand picked in the lava rich soil on a Kona Hawaii coffee plantation, by laborers protected under “fair trade” agreements, is part of the cool coffee culture I guess.  I frequent these coffee palaces because of the exposed brick walls and the wide plank wooden floors, all contributing to a conducive creative writing environment, and excellent people watching!

This gentleman’s display of “otherness” wouldn’t have captured my attention except that the smell of his golden hops laden brew has peeked my olfactory senses.  That is the best smelling beer, wafting it’s way to me from this close proximity. It is said that with our sense of smell we can detect one trillion different scents, that fact being published in the journal, “Science”. Olfaction gets no respect though, not like the showy senses. Research also shows that smell is most linked to our emotional memories.  The sense of smell is the first to develop. Our brains process odors and smells as they go through the olfactory bulb, the smell analyzing part of your brain.  It’s closely connected to the parts of your brain that handle emotion and memory.  So it’s no wonder why the Hilton Head t-shirt clad guy and his beer have stirred a vivid childhood memory.

When I was six years old, my mother’s nephew came to visit us in the big old house on Walnut Place. He was a grown man in his early twenties, and though our age difference was vast, we were first cousins. We didn’t associate with mom’s side of the family, or my father’s for that matter, so I barely knew him. Our lives were tucked neatly away from all scrutiny by design.  The secrets locked away in that house filled me with shame and fear, and created the life long desire to be anyplace but “home”. Home was never safe and secure, quite the opposite. When the doors swung open you never knew what you would find, creating an uneasy anticipation of the unknown, and a terrifying fear of all that was known. We never had the neighborhood kids over to our house. Never. I was embarrassed and believed that my mother’s strange behavior and anger would chase the kids away.  I thought it unusual when this cousin showed up one night unannounced. His navy blue bell bottoms, short sleeved naval shirt rolled up to expose bulging tattooed biceps, Dixie cup hat, and spit shined black shoes alerted me to his status as a Sailor in the United States Navy.  His hair was thick and black, slicked back with grease and glistening. Several long strands of hair would tumble over his eye, and he wrestled it back into place with a meat hook of a hand, fingernails chewed to the quick.

We lived about thirty minutes outside of New York City, in a suburban New Jersey town. Perhaps he was in port for a few days. I didn’t know the details of his visit, just that his arrival one night was different and thrilling, his persona so “other”.  His Baltimore accent became thicker and louder with each bottle of Rheingold beer he swallowed. The brown glass bottles stood around him on the kitchen table in the big green kitchen like so many sailor’s standing muster.  Dark green and black tattoos covered his leathery arms. One tattoo in particular caught my attention, the naked lady posed ever so coyly in pin-up fashion, with ample breasts exposed and red high heels. Every time my cousin’s muscular arm would flex, the naked lady moved seductively, providing a visual excitement and allure that a six year old probably shouldn’t have enjoyed. But I did enjoy it.  I knew it was fresh, but I couldn’t take my eyes off of her.

As the evening wore on, the bottles of beer accumulated, littering our kitchen table. The odor of unfiltered Camel cigarettes, and cheap beer permeated the night, the dingy green walls the backdrop for conversation about relatives past and present.

As my cousin laughed and grinned, his smile punctuated by a few missing teeth, the unexpected evening drew to a close.  When it came time to say our goodbyes, my cousin scooped me up in his arms, gave me a hug and kiss goodbye. His breath smelled strongly of beer, but I didn’t care because I liked him, and his naked lady tattoo.