Don't Want No Clouds in My Coffee

Just as I do every week, I look at my calendar to figure out where I can pencil in a date with a cup of Hazelnut Coffee at Panera Bread in Grossmont Center. Going to the popular eatery has become a pleasant habit in more ways than one. I can’t imagine not being able to go to Panera, much less not being able to watch the birds play and splash in the fountain and families sitting around in the courtyard eating ice cream.

While drinking coffee and having a cup of soup or “You Pick Two” lunch deal or a Toffee Chip Cookie, I’ve enjoyed some lively conversations with friends, one or two of them at a time. The habit of going for coffee at the mall started, in large part, by a challenge from my pastor. He’d encouraged the congregation to read the Bible from cover to cover. With my own copy of the Daily Bible Reading Plan in hand, I knew that I’d have to get out of the house away from my computer and the phone to get on course with reading.

I’d never really tried Panera before, having always gone to a couple of bagel shops around town if I wanted to read for awhile. But I needed a place that I could sit for a couple of hours, comfortable, without any flies hovering around or the fear of being told to leave. I remembered Panera from a lunch gathering from my group of friends from church. The minute I walked in, I smelled the coffee and knew I’d found a niche.

It took me a year and nine months, wrestling with God right there in front of kids climbing on their mother’s lap at the table next to me and the lines of customers ordering a bagel or sandwich. Caffeine gave me the fortitude I needed to slug through difficult passages in I and II Chronicles and Ecclesiastes and James and, of course, Revelation. I came out the other end a stronger person, firmer in my faith and a quickened gait. The latter, I’m sure, for the countless cups of Hazelnut Coffee.

Even my husband has gotten into the habit. When he gets a day or week off from work, we like to commit a morning to coffee and reading, me my Bible or starting on a novel, he the newspaper or a book on science.  Grossmont Center is a true community gathering place. The idea that the mall will be losing its lease in five years sets me on edge.

Last summer, I spoke with La Mesa Vice Mayor Arapostathis for a few moments at one of the concerts at Harry Griffen Park. I told him that a few of my friends had expressed alarm over talk of the lease running out for the mall. He assured me that the City of La Mesa was in conversation with the property owners who live up in North County. The dollar could be well be king in the final decision. But one thing for sure is the people of La Mesa as well as all of East County love the gathering place that Grossmont Center is and they will fight to keep it around or at least get another one built.

On the benches around the fountains in the center of the mall are forged new friendships, old ones refreshed, broken ones reconciled, books discussed by students, plans for the future and just plain plans for fun and shopping, too.  So if and when the mall leaves, people will find another place to gather. For now, I am writing in my calendar a date this week for coffee at Panera and shopping at the Wild Trends store next door, then stop in at See’s Candies for a sample and a couple of lollipops.