SHALL WE GATHER
/THIS IS ABOUT: coffee and commas; pauses and places; gatherings and gauntlets.
Okay, let's get this straight, right from the beginning: commas (and their punctuation buddies) are important, especially in our societal drift to writing where the only function of punctuation is to share emotion ;-(
For example, consider the possible outcomes of these words from a man to his beloved, based solely on the placement of punctuation:
A woman, without her man, is nothing.
Or, more wisely put:
A woman: without her, man is nothing.
This example is from a wonderful book by Lynne Truss called, "Eats Shoots & Leaves". The title comes from this story,
A panda walks into a cafe. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and fires two shots in the air.
"Why?" Asks the confused waiter, as the panda makes towards the exit. The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over his shoulder.
"I'm a panda," he says, at the door. "Look it up."
The waiter turns to the relevant entry and, sure enough, finds an explanation.
"Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves."
Truss says of punctuation's function: "To point up -- rather in the manner of musical notation -- such literary qualities as rhythm, direction, pitch, tone and flow... It tells the reader how to hum the tune."
A comma helps us find a rest, a place to breath.
What does this have to do with coffee and gathering? Check out this from the web page of a little local coffee shop I frequent:
"We’re grateful to be a part of your coffee rhythm today, whether you’re here for rest, work, or play and we hope that you can pause for a moment. It’s the pauses that provide us the opportunity to rest and reflect, celebrate what’s come before, and to prepare for what’s next.
"Every day needs a Comma."
This shop used to be called The Gathering Place. That is until a huge public trust in my hometown of Tulsa, Oklahoma, decided that there could only be one gathering place. After the little coffee shop of that name had been open for people to gather, along came a huge park project along the Arkansas River in Tulsa, to be known as Gathering Place. Apparently, the suits of that enterprise thought people might confuse the two. Imagine: a family from Iowa hears of this amazing park along the river in Tulsa. They load up the SUV and embark on the journey to see it for themselves. But, through some GPS fluke they end up at a storefront coffeeshop in downtown Shawnee, Oklahoma.
Believe it or not, the Goliath-like behemoth charged its attorneys, "Sic 'em!" So, they tell the young families that own the coffeeshop, "Cease and desist! We'll see you in court!" Gauntlet thrown! Or something like that. It's a true story. You can use your favorite search engine to find all the details.
The coffeeshop owners say (in my version of the story), "Hey, pause, breath, have a comma moment."
In defense of the park people, I've been a part of trademark defense, threats, violations and litigation. If your entity has a trademark and you don't defend it, eventually a court could rule that the trademark has ceased to mean anything. Still...
Pushed into a name change, the little-coffeeshop-that-could rebranded and created a better version of themselves. And, guess what, people still gather at their place; now called, "Comma"!!!
Of course, you'll want to visit for yourself. I'm happy to meet you there. The coffee and scones are superb. In the meantime, visit virtually: comma.cafe.
They're right: everyday needs a comma, and for me, most days need a semicolon--just a little longer pause than a comma. Thankfully, at Comma; semicolons are okay too.
A Confession: Before you grammarians sharpen your red pencil to show me the errors of my punctuational way, I don't claim to know what I'm doing. Punctuation is both utilitarian and poetic for me. Like a delicious, cold fruit salad.