Ghost

Since teaching yoga has complicated my availability for working at Austin Java, I've been working only one shift each week; Tuesday is my night at Austin Java. The restaurant began staying open for dinner just recently, so traffic is very light during that time. In fact, from 7pm to close I am the only employee out front. All this changes the experience of working there significantly.

At night, Austin Java seems like just a shadow of what it is during the day. When I think of Austin Java, I think of people bustling in and out, or my coworkers standing around talking. At night the restaurant looks just the same, the music plays like always, but there are no customers and no coworkers. It reminds me a bit of The Langoliers, the movie of a Stephen King story that I saw when I was 10 years old. In the story, some people on an airplane get caught in the recent past where there are no people (because they are all in the present), only places and things. The only seemingly living things they encounter are the Langoliers, creatures that eat up the past.

It's a little bit creepy, a lot solitary. Now that I've come to expect it, I like it, in a way. I just can't seem to give Austin Java up, and a weird, solitary Austin Java is better than no Austin Java.