Siste viator! Stop traveler!

Imagine seeing these words on a grave - where I've read they were put.

I thought they belonged on a blog. Or maybe at Starbucks.

I was sitting here drinking my coffee and thinking about yesterday. I was out in a demo chair and noticed from Starbucks that the clouds in the distance over the university were rather dark. University students were predicting the weather to each other- some from the South hoping to see their first snow and others from New England lamenting the fact that they couldn't ski to class.

At another table sat an older couple. The man read a paper, the woman used a laptop. They were discussing their research over coffee and a shared pastry. Two professors. I eavesdropped with my left ear while my right ear overheard what was going at another table.

Two little girls under nine years old twisting their daddy's arm to go get them a pastry. Their father dutifully went back on line and came back with a treat which he cut in half meticulously as they told him "Mommy doesn't do it that way". He never sat down at the small table with the girls, but stood on one foot, then the other.

Back to the university students, who are now on their individual laptops, white iPod earplugs firmly in, no longer talking to each other about the weather - just wired. On coffee. On technology.

The father and his two little girls leave, bundling up to go outside.

I finish my mocha frappucino and hit the joystick to back away from the table. The older couple smiles and nods at me.

"Have a nice day," the woman says.

"You, too," I reply as I roll toward the door, past the wired students. Outside, two female students with broad smiles open the door for me. I thank them as I roll past.

"Not at all, it's my pleasure," says one. "You're an intrepid traveler."

I smile at her as a friend of mine passing by calls out my name. She asks where I've been and I tell her I have a demo chair so I'm out.

"Cool," she says. "I'll call you. Maybe we can go do something."

I start to tell her I don't know how long I'll have the chair but then realize it doesn't matter. At least not for today. I just roll on.

Siste viator!