I was thinking about the coffee chain Starbucks today. I was doing this while standing in line to order my “tall” coffee which is always greeted with a strange kind of disappointment by the baristas. They want me to come up with some convoluted concoction that they had to go to school to learn how to make. What talents and dazzling skill does it take to simply grab a cup and turn a knob and poor coffee into a cup? Not very much.

Anyway, I was thinking about the general homogenization of America. I was keeping it to this country although, I guess, when you think about it enough companies are all over the world that the entire world has become homogenized. What I mean by homogenized is that everything is pretty much the same no matter what city you go to. This is never more evident, at least to me, than when you walk into a Starbucks.

Personally, I find it somewhat comforting. I recently had two friends come in from out of town. While my friend’s wife was actually doing work it was up to me to entertain the husband. I certainly didn’t mind. I got to show off Chicago which I absolutely love to do. While we were walking around we stopped into some local coffee shop. My friend is a true coffee addict. I will also give him his “props” by saying he also makes a fantastic cup himself. We tried a local place and his reaction to the liquid inside the cup was akin to the look you could get if someone handed you a cup of rancid milk. Given the language he uses to order the drinks he wants, he could be asking for rancid milk for all I know. We promptly disposed of the concoction from the local joint and found the nearest Starbucks. Fortunately there is one ever two and a half feet so it wasn’t too hard to find.

The thing about it is that each Starbucks operation has the same drinks and the same stuff no matter where you go. Each employee is trained to prepare the drinks using the language that has now become common within the American language. My friend, the addict, can walk into any Starbucks anywhere and ask for his venti, yabba dabba do, ipso facto, dingo, flatso, zipidee doo dah, flangie whopper with extra soy sauce or whatever the hell he gets and it will come out the exact same way every time. To some people this is a bad thing, to me, this is a comforting thing.

I hear a lot of people complain about this. They say that the local flavor of communities and towns and cities are disappearing. They say that the things that made each community and city and town unique are vanishing and everything is becoming the same. They talk about this like it’s a bad thing. Of course, I have no idea who “they” are exactly but you hear some people talking about this. Maybe, since it is happening at a faster rate than ever, it isn’t a complaint as much as it used to be but you still hear some people lamenting this fact. I am not one of them.

I am the first to admit I am a homebody. I like my home. I have lived here most of my life. I am comfortable with my city and my neighborhood and the people around here and the streets. I know where to go to get a decent meal and a decent cup of coffee. When I go to another place everything is very hit or miss. You have no idea what you could end up with. If you try hard enough, look up the information, search the phone books and ask the right people you can still find that local flavor. However, you can never be sure about it. What if the cook that everyone in town really likes is off that night? It’s nice to know that some food is the same no matter what or where you are.

I heard a lot of people complain about this sort of thing when strip malls and malls in general started sprouting up like weeds all over the place. Yes, I agree there are some things that are lost with that. I like the small book and independent bookstores, for example, than always going to a Borders or a Barnes and Noble. However, even though I like to do that, it’s still nice to come across one of those big-chain stores and know what you can find in there.

As I mentioned, you can still find the local flavor. The great thing about those big chain stores is that they are also adaptable. You can find some local flavor within those stores. If you want you can find the accents or the little touches to the décor. My friend was surprised to see that the Starbucks stores up here have breakfast sandwiches now. Apparently in St. Louis they haven’t started doing that yet.

Granted the Starbucks here are not selling Chicago-style hot dogs. However, you don’t have to go too far to find one. You can pick up your Starbucks moopie, snoopy, slippy, dippy, mocha, cinco de mayo with soy milk and then walk about two blocks to pick up your Chicago-style hot dog, hold the peppers. Local flavor can co-exist with the mass-produced stuff and it can do so successfully.

The thing that is also interesting is how Starbucks has so permeated our culture. What would happen if some mystical being were to cause every single Starbucks store to vanish into some alternate universe? I think the world itself might collapse as we know it. Certainly the people suffering from caffeine withdrawals would be enough to shut down offices and businesses around the world. The entire world economy would collapse. Anyway, the point is, how many people ever used the word “venti” before Starbucks came into being.

The Starbucks people also have done cute little things to try and make you feel better as well. They call the smallest size you can get a “tall.” I always find it very endearing when an older person walks into a Starbucks and still orders a small, medium or large. I once saw an interview with one of the guys who created the whole Starbucks brand and launched the stores and he said he just wanted people to feel good when ordering the smallest size. Ordering a small just wasn’t as satisfying as ordering a tall.

Not everything about this is good, mind you. I am aware of that. Those big-box stores have been accused of employing companies that use child labor and such, for example. Homogenization is not without its flaws. However, to me, it is just nice to know that if I am in London or, perhaps one day, Outer Mongolia, and I walk into a coffee place with a name I recognize from every street corner in America that I can order the coffee and it will be just the same as it was back in America. I can then go out of the store and get onto my yak and go eat some raw beetles or something.

Bryan W. Alaspa’s novel Dust is available in print and eBook format at his website www.bryanalaspa.com and www.amazon.com.