Starbucks Philosophy

Finding good advice behind a thumbtack.

I found a note pinned to a bulletin board in Starbucks, which could be the closest thing to public poetry that doesn’t require a can of spray paint.

It didn’t even try that hard.
Which made it perfect.

There it was, wedged between a I-need-a-roommate flyer and someone offering guitar lessons “cheap but soulful,” as if the soul came with a discount. And in the middle of all that quiet pleading… this note.

Just three words from a stranger who clearly woke up, said “I need coffee”, and chose philosophy over silence.

It wasn't really meant for anyone…
and somehow, it was meant for everyone.

Someone wrote it on an ordinary day. On a Post-it note.
Just a pen, a thought, and the brave little decision to leave it behind.

And now here I am, fully caffeinated, wondering who they were, who was their target, did their 5 year-old write it, and what crazy coffee concoction they ordered.

You go in for a latte and leave with a fragment of someone else’s thought stuck to your brain like a pastry crumb you can’t brush off your designer sweater.

I didn’t take the note.
That felt illegal.

But I did pull out my phone, so that I could carry with me a reminder that someone out there is feeling something boldly enough to pin it to a bulletin board.

Anyway, I did leave with something else.
A new standard:
Not be perfect.
Just to be myself.

Before you go…
you should probably know who I am.

I’m a lifelong cook, accidental writer,
and professional over-thinker of ordinary moments.

If you like honest, slightly unpolished, occasionally funny reflections—
you might like me too.

If that sounds like someone you’d enjoy sitting next to at dinner,
pull up a chair.