The Fog Blog

Today's Fog was enjoyed on a frost-covered bench outside one of two identical coffee shops on campus (which happens to be 5 minutes apart from one another -  an urban planner's nightmare). My past history with said coffee shop has been alarmingly positive, where many a good fog was enjoyed - especially compared to other Fog-spots on campus. However, after the first sip - the fog was dull. How terribly, horribly sad.  Once again, I took my fog's fate into my own hands and added some sweetener available at the station nearby. I glanced briefly at the label - honey sweetener - how odd. I shrugged and pumped a few shots before I wandered outside.  A splash of cold, brisk air hit me as I left the warm cafe. My fog warmed my hands. The fog was fairly standard, however, closer to the end the honey began to kick in. It felt like deja vu from three weeks ago when I was battling a cold and an outrageous lemon-honey tea addiction. Honey sweet is very different from sweet-syrup sweet...

The ingredients for a good London Fog are dynamic . The process is not a perfect science, nor is it a simple one. There is no such thing as a 'perfect fog', even though legend may speak otherwise. Great Fogs are made with a stable foundation combined with an element of the sweet, however material its source may be.  I sipped this Fog slowly on a late weekend morning. I had slept little the night before, and my mind was moving as sluggishly as the full grey clouds outside. I wasn't particularly warm, nor was I cold - I was extremely present. This isn't a new feeling for me; usually, it's the direct result of living squarely in my head for an extended period of time.  The fog itself was deeply filling. Though not rejuvenated, I was more grounded than I was before. The world had slowed. The clouds lugged across the sky. Today, the secret ingredient of this fog was a new type of sweetener - like honey - but from a different organism entirely. The name escapes me, though...

  This Fog was much more than a fog today, as they often are. This fog was a catalyst for an odd series of events which made the world a little warmer, as any good fog should do.  I hadn't seen her since I had left for my adventure overseas. It had been a month and a bit. A month of waiting, a month of thinking, a month of feeling, a month of dreaming. I was nervous, of course.  We grabbed our drinks (as we do) and walked to a bench alongside a greenway. We chatted like we always did. The conversation was lively, I was sipping my fog and laughing at equal intervals. I had finished my fog realizing I had tasted none of it, but I didn't care. I was with her, and that was all I wanted. We walked back to her house and said goodbye. I turned around, smiled, and began thinking of the next time I'd get to see her. This is one of my favourite homeostatic states.  I smiled to myself as I walked away, the breeze and the sky, the world made me perfectly content. With every step...