What I Learned from Watching Four Men Squabble over a Table
A Short Story About the Power of Connecting
I was sitting in a coffee shop the other day when I turned to see three elderly men nab a much coveted corner booth. I’d practically seen brawls break out over this particular spot.
A gentlemen, who’d apparently been standing in line didn’t take too kindly to the new tenants.
“That’s my seat!” he shouted. “See! I left my newspaper there,” he added before stomping off to pick up his coffee.
One of the men grumbled, “You always see newspapers in coffee shops. How were we supposed to know?” It was a point tenable enough to earn the support of his friends and to justify not budging from their perch.
When the man returned with his coffee, he wasn’t particularly happy to discover the status of his table hadn’t changed.
“Move!” he barked.
What happened next was one of the most poetic transformations I’d seen in recent memory.
One of the gentlemen calmly said, “Why don’t you come sit with us. We’re very interesting.”
Amazingly, the man obliged. For the next half hour the four men traded names, stories, jokes, and genuinely seemed to enjoy one another’s company.
The man who’d claimed the seat earlier completely dropped his guard. The men asked him questions about his work, his past — his life. It quickly became clear no one had in a while.
In the end, a potentially volatile situation was diffused by simply making an effort to connect.
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