3 posts tagged “black water cafe”

Tacoma has lost one of its finest residents.

The Black Water cafe is no more.

With backpack, laptop and Berr Symon, I arrive at its door this morning afternoon for my first cup of coffee -- an Americano with a little room for cream, please -- and am greeted by scrolls of green construction paper draping the window.

The handwritten obituary begins:

After three and a half years of serving the community we love, Black Water Café will be closing its doors. It has been an honor, a privilege and an inspiration to contribute to Tacoma.

It continues to direct customers to other small community coffeehouses and concludes with rolling credits to a long list special supporters.

The Black Water is no more and this time it's not coming back.

I write thusly because it was only a couple months ago that it pulled up stakes from a location with solid and successful business to downtown, considerably smaller in space and "closer to the action." I sensed something amiss, penned reservations something to the effect of "we'll see how it goes."

Sadly, it went as I sensed: south. Not all moves are for the best. Sometimes it's best to leave well enough alone. Either adage is appropriate and changes not the outcome: The Black Water is deceased.

Gone is the cafe where I most liked to write. Quite a number of postings were born at the Black Water. This sentiment holds truer for its prior location than the second, which suffered from a set of flaws, including poor seating -- four tables were inadequate for cafe that renowned and popular. Unlike its former location that was spacious and bright and for me felt like writing in the middle of an open field, the second was tight, narrow and dusty and felt like writing and sipping coffee inside a large closet.

The move of course didn't altogether deter a hardcore set of devotees, a cult, a sect of the funky and the creative, cool and disenfranchised, eclectic and experimental. And it continued serving the best damn espresso in town. Yet unlike Stella of the film fame, the Black Water never got its groove back. It couldn't. The conditions weren't right.

I loved going to the Black Water, a walk approximately seven blocks from my abode through a neighborhood that juxtaposes seediness and re-invention of self. The steep slopes were easy going down and a bitch going up and usually when I was in a rush to get to work in time because I'd hung out at the Black Water too long.

Thus it is with sadness, but not surprise, that I pen my own epitaph for the cafe whose final resting place is on St. Helen's Avenue.

I bid a warm and loving adieu to the Black Water. Your death leaves a hole in the soul of Tacoma and in the hearts of your countless admirers and devoted family members. You are remembered. You are missed. You are irreplaceable. And you served the best damn espresso in all of Tacoma!

We shan't ourselves soon enough but may you rest in peace, holy Black Water cafe.

Sometimes ya gotta wonder what goes into decisions.

The best cafe in town has moved.

By best I mean incredibly cool, earthy, funky, divey. The Black Water was Berkeley late 1960s. A burnt orange couch with mismatched throw pillows. A second couch, I don't remember the color but pretty sure it mismatched.

A coffee table between them on which rested magazines, newspapers, a chess board, someone's feet.  One wall sprouting announcements of groups, gigs, goings-on and beneath that a long bench with an array of flyers, freebie magazines.

Good solid square tables lining one long length of the room whose wall features rotating art by local artists -- sketches, framed photographs of scenes from around the state and world.

Chairs each different from the next that looked like they'd been plucked up at yard sales.

And my personal favorite, two antique Smith Corona typewriters, often found gracing the counters along the windows where the cafe's world and outer world converged.

Dunno whether they had ink ribbons and where do you even get those any more? Each time I entered and my eyes laid rest on the old Smith Corona, I felt warmed and charmed beyond measure.

Those typewriters are very much like the one I learned on way way back. My home has always been at a typewriter, or, today's modern replacement, the computer keyboard.

I still remember that old typewriter, black with the shiny black keys and white letters that required pressure to deliver the leaded letter to the platten with a sharp clack. My fingertips sprang into life and they haven't died yet.

The Black Water was a magnet and gathering place for all sorts, artists, students, retirees, gay and straight and in-between. A man with his small dog on a leash. A mother cupping the hand of a child. In one case a 30-ish mom comfy on the couch with friends nonchalantly watching her lad throw a lengthy tantrum, then rewarding it with a lollipop.

A retired Spanish teacher who's there with a book, always, reading through her wide lenses. A youngish fellow always with his tiny computer leaning in so close that his nose nearly touches the screen. (He looks like me without my glasses!)

It had one damn solid Wi-Fi signal. Occasionally it didn't work, yeah, but the 99.9% of the time I was there it sailed along beautifully.

And electrical outlets galore. You could sit for hours -- as many did, including myself -- with a laptop, your homework, reading materials, sketch pads on one cup of coffee. Free refills on the drip.

And the coffee? Excellent. The drip is very very good; it's the espresso that shoots 'em to the top of the list. Finest in town. The Black Water knows its coffee. They do it well. And they do it right. (And at affordable prices.)

Pretty much everything I just wrote about: gone. They just relocated a mere, oh, six blocks from their former space.

The staff, equipment, furniture were moved. Unfortunately, the charm remained behind. Because -- and I cringe writing this but I must because it's accurate -- the new space doesn't work.

I want it to work, of course, for I'm in that large number of dedicated, loyal and impassioned Black Water-ees.

And I'm realistic. And here's why the new space pales considerably.

The old space was one large spacious room with plentiful seating. It felt open, wide, comfortable, inviting, cozy without being confining.

The new space is like a railroad car, narrow, tight and considerably smaller.

The barista counter's there of course (though much shorter). Gone are the colorful faux stained-glass sweeping fixtures that hung above the counter, the bright oranges and greens, yellows and reds.

Gone is the ample seating. Now there's two cafe tables that seat three, cramped.

And, by the one window, a coffee table surrounded by four or five chairs. Not particularly conducive to laptopping, homework, writing or sketching. The seating's dropped from, oh, 30 comfortably to a third that, uncomfortably.

At the back in a small windowless room are two couches, approximate maximum capacity of three. There's no table, which leaves no place to set a coffee cup except on the lap or on the floor with the hope that no one will step on it because the two couches nearly fill the room, leaving little room to stretch or turn.

Plugs for laptops: one in the back, one in the front, that's it. (A sad comparison to the prior wall lined with outlets.)  And I've still not been able to get online though technically they're up and running.

My first true visit was frustrating. I was in the rear cramped quarters (that feel dusty and unfinished, time may fix that) trying to juggle a laptop and an Americano with no place to set either except on my lap and floor.

When the front window seating opened up, I moved forward. Again, I tried to get comfortable. But a low coffee table is not conducive to laptopping. And I still couldn't get online. By this time, my Americano was lukewarm. Still plenty tasty, mind you; seriously, no one does espresso better than the Black Water.

I finally had to pack it up and move to somewhere else -- only where?

Uninviting. That's the word for it. Confining.

For reasons known to the owner, manager, perhaps the staff, the Black Water gave up and traded in a spectacular and creative space that truly worked for, well, a shoebox.

I'll return of course to see whether the Black Water can get back its groove.

I want it to work - very much so -- and perhaps in time when the dust settles, it will. Or not, because though the devotees may remain, the physical space will continue imposing constraints and restraints, it's the nature of that beast.

I mourn the ending of the Black Water, a Tacoma icon, in its former incarnation and the disappearance of my one true coffeehouse hangout. There are no others; there can be no substitute or replacement.

All of which illustrates that not all changes are for the better ...

I feel lost, hanging in midair, like walking without feet touching the ground.

And I return to the lead: Sometimes ya gotta wonder what goes into decisions ...

Well, that was some work day. Barely.

Sundays are my only early-morning routes and their number is typically low. This morning three of the four routes canceled. Nothing unusual in that save for the annoyance of the one fellow who routinely cancels such that we should stop booking his rides.

Result: effectively an entire Sunday’s dropped into my lap. With the “home” situation being unwelcoming and uninviting, I’m out and about for roughly the next nine hours till he retires.

So my first stop is the black water cafe. Now, I’ve the nose of a hound when it comes to tracking down cafes and pubs in any town, be it where I live or on the road, and specifically those Wi-Fi’ed and offering outlets to keep the battery juiced.

The black water ranks high on my esteemed list of fav cafes. It looks like it seeped out of Berkeley circa late 1960s, both in its clientele and interior. Large tiles of burnt orange and blood red comprise the floor, the walls are painted in various shades of cream, tangerine orange, whispering pale green and a dark mossy-gray green. A huge share of the latter wall is dedicated blackboard divided up with lime-margarita green paint into 35 squares, creating the month’s calendar. A day of a band's performance is duly noted with white chalk notes or a flyer.

Along the length of the longest wall runs a painted black pew, for lack of a better descriptor, square tables and ample power outlets built into the "pew." Limited seating's also available at the window counters where two of the three manual SmithCorona typewriters sit.

Threaded along that long wall is a clothesline (or similar) and attached to it with clothespins are roughly three dozen sketches on large rag paper in pastel chalks, apparently, of children's articles of clothing ... a toddler’s yellow dress ... a boy’s purple buttoned shirt ... green knickers ... a girl's billowy white blouse.

At the back is, by loose definition, a sitting room defined by two very funky, very dated and very orange couches. Couches like those that your grandmother with tacky taste would have. One's striped in three shades of bright orange that's almost painful to my sensitive eyes to look at; the other’s a more somber but also more worn burnt orange love seat with thickly padded soiled arms that somehow work here. Anchoring is a comparatively nondescript wooden black apparatus with a weave like that on a poolside chaise lounge. An old coffee table with drawer sits center and atop it is the third SmithCorona typewriter.

The cabinet contraption for the napkins, lids, straws, sugars, half-and-half sports a fire-engine red paint and black board. Above the coffee counter hangs a 2-foot-long drop of stained glass plates of varying sizes and colors -- red, greens, black, orange and cream, to coordinate with the room. 

There's the (requisite) shelving loaded with flyers, freebie publications, books and two chess boards, one of which is glass. One can easily and comfortably hang here talking, reading, writing or surfing the Net for hours and be under no pressure to get a move on or buy. I walk around in bare or stockinged feet (I hate shoes, ya know!) and raise nary an eyebrow. When the weather’s nice, as it is today, the front door is opened and the breeze enters, accepting the invitation.

All this contributes to the charms of this dive, in the positive sense, but what solidifies its location on my personal map is its coffee, most notably its espresso-based beverages.This is no purveyor of fru-fru coffee concoctions. Coffee's their art and passion. The Americano taken the third time stopped me in my tracks, compelled me to inquire of the part-punky-part-hippy barista with the tats and nose ring what it is that makes their java so damn good. She explained that the owner's serious about his beans and the process by which they're transformed into liquid in the cup; another employee chipped in on the importance of and value the owner places on barista skills.

It shows.

Moreover, any place that expresses on its Web page its philosophy thusly:

coffee
should be
black as hell
strong as death
and sweet as love.

is a place after my own heart. It's kismet.

And tough to top the black water with its laid-back vibe, its stable Wi-Fi signal and wide-ranging clientele, from students gabbing up a talkfest to silent readers curled into the furniture to surfers focused on their laptops to aging locals. Sure, the couches are eyesores, the linoleum dull, the tables a little worse for their wear and the chairs mismatched as if they were collected up from garage sales.

Yet when it comes to coffee, colors and charm, the black water wears them well. It's no surprise that it was once again voted the No. 1 favorite cafe hangout recently by the readership of the arty-cultural freebie weekly ... and on this infrequent occasion I do not mind being part of the crowd.

So huzzah! to the timeless black water cafe; it'll outlive us all.