West Coast - Northbridge

West Coast – Northbridge

The morning wakes wide with the chatter of spoons rattling across coffee cups and ceramic saucers, demitasse dreams steam in clouds of yawning as ink flows again and wide-eyed words begin to rise and write themselves between the thin tramlines of fat yellow sunlight.  The purring prowl of the Blue CAT bus smooths past my table, heads down along the palm trees of James Street, and disappears from view somewhere before the Horseshoe Bridge.  The silent flight of a departing plane is reflected through the crema of my espresso and across its flat, black surface – stretching deep and wide the blue sky opens up and thoughts of travel return again.  Lucky then, that John Lennon sings somewhere that ‘Life is what happens when we’re busy making other plans…’

 

Sitting outside Sorrento Restaurant at mid-morning and everywhere surrounding seems so full of life – James Street busy with passing traffic, people on foot walking one way or another, vespas and vans delivering vegetables and messages ferry past tooting horns of ciao comé va, open palms waving out from behind steering wheels, resting bodies having danced all night move so slowly over drying flagstones sluiced clean from the night before concealing all secrets seen – even the insides of yesterday’s newspapers drift face down and fast asleep along the kerb.  Man, I’d almost forgotten how much I love this place.

 

The more I travel the more I realise the ease in which we can forget to appreciate what little gems we have in front of us.  We become blinded by the repetitions of routine.  We can begin to lose track of our footsteps during our journeys, distracted instead by destinations or departing planes streaking across the skies, impatient for the future – so exotic and so much better - wishing away the here and the now, wasting our imagination on daydreams of tomorrow, forgetting our blessings as life keeps moving past.  If we are careful enough we can exist outside of this Time; we can stop still for just a brief moment within this flow and try to catch a fleeting glimpse of what’s around us now because whether we like it or not, it is later than we think.

 

Back at Sorrento, back at James Street, back on a sunlit tablecloth, I am asked, ‘Desidera un’altro café?’

 ‘Si, un espresso, per favore.’ 

 

 Yes, one more coffee – there must always be time for one more coffee…especially here in a little gem like Northbridge.   I look up for the plane but it’s long gone.  Morning shadows have begun to shorten, dancing and moving around me in the coloured sunshine – pockets of silence heave through James Street.  Time is moving as it should. 


The Blue CAT bus returns around again, passing by from right to left, driving down through the avenue of palm trees, towards the Horseshoe Bridge, stopping briefly by the lights outside the Brass Monkey alehouse before disappearing somewhere down William Street. 

These little moments, these sweet siestas must be treasured, the joy of being before the doing gets in the way… just as my coffee arrives I overhear an exchange of hellos from two elderly friends meeting nearby: ‘…life is good and the joints are too...’  Yeah, that’s what I heard.