‘Out past Santa Fe- out past even the outskirts of Santa Fe- there is a rundown little diner called ‘Betty Sue’s.’ A sign on the door advertises ‘The best coffee in the USA.’ What makes ‘Betty Sue’s’ different than all the other diners that advertise similarly?
Nothing.
All of them are lying. You will not walk into any diner in the USA and have the best coffee there. You will not ever have the best coffee in the USA. If you are reading this book, or even looking at the cover, or even standing in the same room as a copy, you will never have the best coffee. The best coffee in the USA is reserved for the wealthy elite. The demographics for readers of this book and for the obscenely rich are two separate and perfect circles, never meeting. The wealthy elite who drink the best coffee in the USA have never heard of this book or even of a travel guide. They have people that describe places to them and those paid place-describers are likely wealthy enough to have never read this book either.
People like you and me are allowed to consume the worst coffee. We are allowed to consume the hottest coffee. We are allowed to consume coffee, in general. These are privileges that, at any moment, could be stripped away by the sort of wealthy elite who drink the best coffee. They could, at any moment, make coffee hotter and worse than anything we could imagine. They could halt the harvest of coffee, make its consumption illegal. If they then chose to brew only the worst coffee in the world, then it would technically also be the best coffee and it would belong to them.
There are those of you who might think that your own technique for brewing coffee is best on a personal level. You are wrong. There are those who believe any coffee shared with a lover or intellectual rival or with a cigarette is the best coffee. Wrong on all counts.
The best coffee in the USA available from a roving pop-up barista for-hire. She works for whomever will pay her the most per cup. She only brews once per day. When pressed for her secret she says ‘It’s just hype, anyone can make a perfect cup of joe.’
But then she smiles and winks to suggest that’s not the case at all.
She does not drink her own coffee. The wealthy elite forbid it.
-an excerpt, Autumn by the Wayside
