Frankie For Five Minutes.

I am sitting here at Starbucks, at street level, leaning back in my chair, a steaming Americano brew in front of me, my legs stretched out and resting on the sill at perfect ottoman height. I look out at the street and all the passersby… what a diverse and colorful world. The sky above is clear, pristine blue and cut in half horizontally by the overhead walkway that spans Mall to Mall between bustling street. Looking out this window is like watching a gigantic high resolution big-screen T.V… or like suddenly noticing one of those way-too-perfect promotional photos that brag about Fuji color or Kodak moments!
I feel profoundly at ease.

But the real thing that is capturing my attention right now is the girl at the till… the Starbucks girl to the left of me, about twenty feet away. She is bursting in Fuji-color perfection. For the last fifteen minutes or so I’ve been watching her. It is remarkable.
With each and every customer (and there is a perpetual line-up of these) she renews this amazing, genuine smile for them.
“Hi, what can I get for you?” she asks, and she thrusts her head forward over the till, focusing directly on the customer as though they were the only person in the world, and she beams that smile. I’m sitting here looking at her “work it” and I am thinking that it would be impossible for anyone to be more courteous or respectful towards customers.
She is a live-wire, quick and efficient, laughing, smiling, whirling about, whipping energy left and right like a severed power line zapping the air in an effort at re-connection.
The smile transforms her into something positively beautiful. She is already attractive without it, despite her extremely boyish hairstyle. Her hair is a dark black, and straight, short, parted at the side, and near Frankensteinish in profile. No curvature to it, just a sheer right-angle drop from the nether end of that clifflike cranium. I’m even wondering if her hair is just pillow-flattened and she hasn’t fluffed it out yet… which, in itself, says to me that she is not even trying. And I like that. She is not false. Not a showgirl. Genuine.
And she’s pale, even ghost-like, which leads me to speculate that the hair is not an original raven black. But that smile… it lights up everything in her vicinity, including herself.

Starbucks has a barista-style work ethic going on. It makes for better efficiency. Each person is a trained “barista” or skilled coffee stylist… so they alternate between making the lattes and cappuccinos and americanos etc., and working the cash. It’s like a rotation system. It’s like a circus back there and it’s fun to watch. I’ve been watching for years.
Anyways, so this girl… in honor of her hair I’m going to call her Frankie… even when she is not in front of the till but somewhere on the barista 40-yard line… she is still calling out “Can I get something started for anyone in line?” And again, flinging out that gorgeous smile to the entire line-up, brightening up the day not only for them, but also for people twenty feet away… you know… people that are writing a blog-essay about her.

If I were the owner/manager of this establishment and came in here incognito… sat down where I am presently sitting and observed Frankie for five minutes… I would get up, walk over to her behind the counter, and whisper in her ear… “I am giving you a raise of 20%, effective yesterday!”