do you like hugs?

song: do you… – artist: miguel

I’m pretty sure this is currently my favorite line in a song. Especially since it’s essentially followed by, "feel like we got so much in common now." I mean, c’mon! It’s pretty ridiculously awesome! (heavy on the ridiculous, but still!)

I keep thinking I’m going to have this magical free moment for writing and catching up, then I keep filling those moments with things like CreativeRush events or painting my nails or binging on season 4 of Arrested Development. You know, important stuff. (I realize for many of you, I’ll need to explain the CreativeRush thing. I’ll come back to it.) In any case, the plan is for this to be a bit of a "what’s been going on/a few months ago, I had no idea Wichita could be this awesome" entry. It might get kind of long. And, like many of my ponderings, it starts with coffee.

Today, it was filled with Espresso To Go Go’s bricks-and-mortar opening (THIS IS WHERE ALL THE EXCLAMATION POINTS GO!!!!!) and (finally) kicking off my Wichita art acquisitioning, as well as the last of Riverfest/my minimal darting into Riverfest activities.

Have I ever gotten into the (previously) sad state of Wichita coffee affairs here? I feel like I’ve at least touched on it before. Did I even mention my mini Starbucks boycott here? (I got sassed by a "barista" for ordering too many shots of espresso and so I didn’t visit a Startbucks for the better part of a year – felt a little silly, and then I’d realize I wasn’t really missing anything other than a bit of convenience by going elsewhere for joe. Now I don’t get coffee from them because the last time I went and ordered an unflavored, unsyruped latte it tasted weirdly sweet, like it had residue from some other beverage in it. It was gross, y’all.) I know both of these things have featured heavily on the Book of Faces. In any case, I moved to Wichita towards the end of November in 2009 and, before Christmas, discovered that despite the plethora of higher education facilities, often a harbinger of excellent java, Wichita seemed super okay with mediocre-to-crappy coffee.

In 2011, I found out about a local roaster that was passionate about his coffee. Things started looking up. Though he did have pretty minimal hours. Still, at least I could get decent beans in town. 2012 saw two developments, Espresso To Go Go was born in August (I found out about them a month or two later) and the local roaster I relied on had reduced his hours to 8-10am on Saturdays, offering a single selection/variety of beans (that was super fresh, as it was roasted on Friday). So, yay for finally having great coffee beverages again, but sadface for having reduced access to beans in town. Espresso To Go Go started out in an Airstream, joining the burgeoning fleet of Wichita’s food trucks, offering one thing, espresso drinks. You guys, THEY ARE AMAZING! Given the nature of food trucks being a bit nomadic around town, I usually only caught up with them on Saturdays, but it was so worth it. I was immediately in love with their espresso passion and skills, and in a short amount of time I was smitten with the awesome couple that provided me with coffee that finally returned coffee hope to my Wichita existence. 2012 also saw the discovering of Blacksmith Coffee Roastery, which is located in a town about an hour away, but a local retailer sells their beans, so I still had another option if I didn’t get coffee in that two-hour window.

Now, 2013 brings SUPERAWESOMEPANTS developments in Wichita’s coffee scene!!! First, Espresso To Go Go went bricks-and-mortar! Which means access to them for more hours as well as not being so weather dependent (they let customers come to their driveway a few times this winter, as long as the weather was in that place of being inhospitable to take the Airstream out, but decent enough customers could venture their way), nor generator dependent (which could limit their hours)! I missed them for a month. A whole month! But given that was largely due to them getting their new place ready, it was totally worth it. Plus, they were just BEAMING today! Their happy faces warmed my heart and their wonderful beverages made my mouth so, so happy! (You can see them be adorable in their Airstream here.)

I love them, not only for bringing excellence to one of my favorite beverages, but also because I’ve gotten to see tiny, intimate moments between a couple that is clearly in love and that values each other. There is such a constant barrage of not-so-lovely relationship images and expectations in our everydays that we could all use more glimpses of the good stuff in our lives. They are a consistent source for me and I’m so grateful for that. Honestly, even more than them making my Wichita coffee sads disappear, and that was a pretty big deal. Like, we’re talking (an admittedly "first world problems" level of) quality of life/a major reason I would be happy to leave Wichita kind of big deal.

Another TOTALLY EXCITING Wichita coffee development is Reverie Coffee Roasters! They officially open on Monday, but they had a booth at the Riverfest Marketplace this weekend and were selling their beans (and slow brewed/pour over coffee, but I’d already had a whole lot of espresso from Espresso To Go Go before I wound up at the Marketplace). Ann & Warren (the awesomeness that is Espresso To Go Go) had vouched for Reverie (Reverie had serviced Sophia, their lovely Italian espresso maker, when she went into her new location), which I was glad for, because I was already planning on checking out Reverie’s coffee today. The Reverie team is also passionate about their coffee, and I’m looking forward to brewing up their beans in the morning. I also found out I’d already taken the picture of one of the Reverie team at a CreativeRush event. Look at us coming full circle! 🙂

I found out about CreativeRush last August, but didn’t make it out to a 1st Tuesday Talk until December. It’s a non-profit whose goal is to foster community among creatives as well as provide inspiration and a place to connect/collaborate with other creative individuals. But the thing that I immediately was attracted to about it was that the whole basis of the organization is that everyone is creative. I was hoping my initial impression would hold up when I got around to experiencing it for myself. It totally did! I wound up meeting the founder (who is this one-woman powerhouse of awesome, and manages to pull off a whole lot of amazing stuff with barebones budgets and teams) at that first event. (A 1st Tuesday Talk consists of three panelists and a moderator from various fields discussing whatever the topic of the night is. They take place the first Tuesday of the month and they are the staple of CreativeRush. This year has seen other events launching in the mix. August will be CreativeRush’s two-year-anniversary. It has been really cool to continually discover the impact it has had on the creative/art scene in Wichita.)

It has been a bit of a whirlwind experience since December. A fast friendship occurred with Kylie (the founder) and I’ve had the opportunity to be one of her steady volunteers. There can be not-so-glamorous moments, but it is so rewarding and I’m grateful for this season. I’m learning so many things. A lot of them obvious, like what goes into transforming a space from a restaurant into a Mad Hatter-themed experience, or getting routine photography practice documenting CreativeRush’s explosion of rad that’s happening this year. The not so obvious has been to see Kylie in action, how she handles the immense variety of personalities that come with doing this sort of thing and how she so awesomely navigates her way through all of the strange things, or sometimes just the volume of things, that have to be addressed. She’s also been responsible for me discovering this vast wealth of individuals that immediately find a place in my heart with their wonderfulness.

About the same time I was discovering that Wichita needed to up its coffee game, I was (unrelatedly, despite some of the implications about a paragraph ago) coming to the realization that Wichita wasn’t going to be the place I rooted in for the long-term. So, you know, not even two full months into my time here. Sometimes you just know a place isn’t home for you, no matter the duration of your time there. So has been the case for Wichita. I know for me, when facing this realization, it can take some effort to find a way to embrace the locale, especially if there’s an element of the indefinite about the duration of my time there. I often have to remind myself that it is so thoroughly home for other people and attempt to see beyond all the obvious (to me) reasons I won’t be staying. It didn’t take long for me to miss so many things about upstate New York, despite the fact that it never felt like home, either. I missed my friends and routines and so many things it had to offer (such as, here, it takes three stores to replicate a Wegmans, or how it used to take three coffee places to replicate Soul Full Cup, or that it didn’t take much more than stepping out your door to be on a hike – a real hike, not just a fancy way to say "a walk," or that most weekends held easy diversions [that I was aware of]). Really, though there were occasional glimmers of some of the best things here, I still felt very "meh" about this place. Until this year.

I’m getting to see some of the very best people ever, no matter the region, and I’m seeing this group of people, just by being them, and by being awesome together, steadily, and somewhat quickly, change the complexion of this place. I know to an extent that being immersed in this group means I’m getting larger doses and more magnified views of this change. But I’m frequently finding myself in conversations where I’m finding out Wichita has been on this swift course to awesome over the last five-or-so years and it’s only gained momentum over the last two years that CreativeRush has been on the scene. And I find myself so grateful to have gotten swept up in this tide of good hearts. I love these people. They’ve helped me to love this city. It was something I was unable to arrive at on my own and I’m so glad I’m not having to try to wrangle myself into it anymore.

And, with this lengthy bit of text, this seems a good place to wrap it up. The plan is to get back here (sooner than later) to make good on the request for an introspective deep thinking entry. 🙂

I love you all! I hope you’ve been having a most excellent weekend!