Cup of Joe

With a few empty, itinerant hours to kill between my seventh grade classroom and my eleven o'clock Spanish literature course, I found myself—diverted from my original intention to read on the venerable, uneven stones of the wall that spoons the Rio Darro—clumsily pursuing a stunning vista of the Sierra Nevada mountains.

It wasn´t as romantic as it sounds.

Chasing the view but equally determined to find a comfortable place from which to enjoy it, I found myself moments later on a low-shaded bench, a cafe just a few steps away... charming, but my view was utterly obstructed by the seven- and eight story buildings of Granada’s bustling downtown.

Still, I pulled out several books from my book bag and, passing over my Spanish novel for the moment, I opened Anne Lamott’s, Traveling Mercies. It wasn’t long after that a woman approached, asking me rather presumptuously to lend her money for a “café.” Well, I´d been reading about grace and Anne Lamott´s zany humor, and with the unformed thought that this moment might surprise me with unexpected grace, I grudgingly pulled my wallet from my bag.

She told me it cost five Euro.

I looked at her askance, asking incredulously, “for a cup of coffee…?”

“And some toast,” she replied.

I very well knew a cup of coffee and some toast would cost perhaps, perhaps two and a half euro. (And that´d be an expensive piece of toast), and told her I’d give three. (In the .1 seconds that I had to think about it, it seemed like a comprise… It became quickly evident, however, that is was a victory. Her victory). As she walked away proudly with my three euro in her hand, I muttered grudgingly, ¨Que dios te bendiga,¨ which, with wholly unveiled hostility, sounded more like a threat than a blessing.

Here´s the thing: I didn´t feel blessed. I felt had. What gall, to ask me for a $7 (US currency) cup of coffee!

She didn´t look up at me with the grateful smile of the accordion player who often plays beneath the cathedral, one eye half closed, and who I often like to thank with a coin for his music; songs at once stunning and melancholy, humble.

She didn´t bring her fist to her heart and dip her knees, like the guitar-playing duo I had encountered weeks before, thanking me for a mere 50 cent-piece with a gesture so genuinely humble—exuding such gratitude—it left me momentarily motionless in the street, laughing in delighted wonder, wishing I had given more.

She didn´t smile as we stopped outside the supermarket with a spare coin, handkerchief covering hair and hand cupped to receive it, and ask if I was my host mother´s daughter, laughing along with her clumsy explanation as though she was an old friend.

Or offer a quick smile like the town mime, who steps willingly out-of-character to talk with curious children, or tourists, or passers-by.

No, she was proud. She lacked the humility I had come to expect from someone earning their living on the street, keening on the accordion, or dipping his knees gratefully, or blessing us with her laughter. And without such humility, I found myself entirely devoid of compassion.

Maybe then, the blessing is the dissolution of expectations... that, because they live on the street, they ought to be humble, they ought to be grateful, that compassion is earned.

Either way, I was had by the gypsy woman who asked me for an absurdly expensive cup of joe. Who demanded—because who was stopping her?—a 5E piece of toast. And who left the cafe without either, but with my 3E clutched in her fist.

So maybe I should just laugh it myself. Laugh because, even in my giving, I expect to be rewarded, or at least reimbursed… with music, or humility, or laughter. At the very least, with the sense that I’ve done some good. Laugh because, have I ever given genuinely without this expectation? Laugh because at twenty, I ought to know how to give, but God is still, (still!) giving me lessons in giving.