The Bad News That's Brewing On My Block

A couple of weeks ago, B mentioned that he thought the cafe at the end of my block was going to be demolished. I went in search of verification and found it in a back issue of the Seattle P-I. Bummer! The B&O Espresso (for Belmont and Olive, the intersection where it resides), does indeed seem to be slated for extinction. The B&O has been around for 30 years and was one of the original Seattle coffee houses. I had my first B&O latte on the first night of an exploratory trip out here. I was so far away from my home in Chicago and when we stopped in on that cold, rain-soaked January night I didn't know that within a month Capitol Hill would become my new home. The B&O was the place where B and I first met in person one afternoon four years ago to figure out if we wanted to move beyond being merely Internet acquaintances. Its genteel, shabby pseudo-Victorian interior has served as the backdrop to a number of beginnings and endings in my life, and I really don't want to see it go. Where will the next important events in my life occur if not at the B&O? The P-I article states that in its place will rise a six story "mixed-use" building with condos, shops and underground parking, destined to serve as a knife to the heart of my quiet residential existence. Ugh. The noise, the mess, my memories and all the other displaced memories of thirty years of coffee, tiramisu and the most amazing breakfasts; all swirling around to create a stifling blanket of renovation hell which will surely suffocate the charming character of my home as it descends. Will this actually come to pass? I don't know for sure right now, but the thought of it is making me really sad. People are meeting and talking. Impact studies are afoot. Perhaps it's not too late.