Coffe SignThese are the best words I hear every day! Meet me for coffee. Maybe they come from my friend Robin, who loves to escape with me in the middle of crazy days. Sometimes I hear them from my neighbors over the side fence. Most often I hear these words from my husband, ready to connect on the back porch after a long day. I wish I could hear these words from family and friends who are too far away to rendezvous at our favorite Starbucks. Meet me for coffee. I feel warm inside just thinking about it. Maybe that’s the power of the concept of “Third Place” so popular right now. Something inside of us longs to connect over warmth and friendship. In a coffee shop you can be whoever you want to be at that moment. I even have friends I only see at my favorite coffee shop (which happens to be inside Barnes and Noble…no surprise there!). And I think I inherited the coffee shop gene. When my dad died several years ago we had to make the rounds of all the local Dunkin’ Donuts, in order to inform the myriad of characters he’d met at each one over the years. That might be how I’d like to be remembered myself…with a last round of Starbucks tasting opportunities to celebrate my homegoing. Just a thought!