A City of Coffee Mug to another northern place

No doubt, the text of this tribute

would sooner leap from one's hands

than linger in their provenance,

and in deference to the crockery,

I shall be brief. 

The City of Coffee Mug has been

awarded once before, as a mutation

of a blogging prize dispensed here

some time ago. Poetically, the

Canadian of our first recognition

is no longer publishing; but he cer-

tainly must again, and for all we

know, could well be.

This vessel means to encourage

that blogger who is generously

creative and unarbitrary, aware 

of an artistic exertion in self-

presentation, and of humane intent. 

These risks bear a price, and are 
fundamental to the city of coffee.

These few characteristics but 

superficially describe the blog

we know as Linnea. I'll not im-

pose a quiz because all readers 

are aware that this is a project 

of a med student musician from 

a cold climate, famous for

posting spontaneous "graffiti"

from her home city, which turn

out to be elegant aperçus of

more than its surfaces; notes

on human health which go to

the bottom line of the human

condition; reminiscences and

reports from a romantic rela-

tionship of already transpar-

ent trust; reflections on music

of enormously sociable enthus-

iasm; to say nothing of tender

and humane internal monologues

whenever she feels like it,

which uncannily have to do

with everyone else.

She is exempt from snobbery's

intimidations and immune to its

seductions; she is capable of

amusement where it is offered,

and disarmingly charitable in

remarking on her preferences.
She has never cited privilege 
as a feature of taste, dropt
a name, or exhibited glamour -
all infallible ways of drawing
our attention, just not hers.
She's what a doctor or recital-
ist has to be: she's fearless. 

All very good, you may be
thinking; but with these
omissions, how can one be-
lieve there is any there,
there?


Because she knows a good
story will depict desire
without the anticlimax of
possession; but that its
narrator will experience
credibly, and conjure the
defeat of, the cruelest bar 
to pleasure.

There's a little Sidney Carton
in every such acknowledgment.
Maybe there needs to be - the
rule, praising the exception. 
I have no illusion of escap-
ing that rule; I am grateful 
that she lightens it. 

A City of Coffee Mug to Linnea, 

of warmth.

Photographs©  Linnea