An Army of Normal Folks - The Secret Coffee Club That Can Heal Your Community (Pt 2)

Episode Date: July 7, 2026

What if one of the biggest solutions to loneliness, toxic division, and disconnection isn't another app or social media platform—but a simple cup of coffee? Ron Sparks and his friend Adam Foster started inviting small groups of people to semi-secret coffee gatherings in beautiful outdoor spaces. There was no agenda. No networking. No politics. Just coffee, conversation, and community. What began as a quirky idea has grown into a movement, inspiring over 60 people from across the world to apply to host a "Hush Hush Nomadic Cafe" in their community.  In this conversation with Ron, you'll discover: Why small gatherings are often more powerful than big events How to create genuine community wherever you live That crazy things can sometimes happen—if you just start  If you've ever wished your community felt more connected, welcoming, or your own life had more meaningful relationships, this episode is for you. 🔗 Learn more about Hush Hush Coffee and the Nomadic Café movement: https://hushhushcoffee.comSupport the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/#joinSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey, everybody. It's Bill Courtney with an army of normal folks, and we continue now with part two of our conversation with Ron Sparks right after these brief messages from our generous sponsors. This is an I-Heart podcast, guaranteed human. Joy is essential, and it's also elusive. But now, there's a new and exciting way to start your journey toward a more joyful existence. Joy 101. It's a new. new podcast hosted by me, Hoda Kotby. If you're craving inspiration to maximize your joy, tune into these candid, uplifting, and moving on-air chats. Listen to Joy 101 on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Joy 101 with Hoda Kotby is presented by CVS.

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indicates, slow down. Like it has a phonetic sound that makes you want to calm down. It really does. Yeah, it's very cool. Honestly, it's like I like the way it sounds. I think that's part of like where it comes from too. Quiet, quiet coffee is almost like a demand. Hush is like chill.

Yeah, if there's a quiet quiet coffee out there, that's cool. It's fine. It's fine. I don't think there's a quiet coffee, but if there is, whatever. Yeah. A lot of people, small, one of the first things you say is, hey, man, what do you do?

You know, indicating what do you do for living? What, you know, what do you do? What do you into? That question is banned at nomadic coffee, right? Yeah, I mean, by model, more than by decree, like, because we don't have rules, but... But you're just like, we're not going to ask that. Let's try not to ask that.

Why? Yeah, yeah. I think part of it is, like, social status. So, like, normalizing status. Like if you come there and you're like, I'm CEO of XYZ. Like, okay, suddenly we're in a position of your CEO, what am I? And now do I need to prove my status by judging something up? Do we not need to connect?

Do you have value for me? And there are places where that is cool and fine, and that's what people are there to connect around that. But we're not a networking event. And so there are people who are really passionate about their work, and that's going to come out. And the way they're going to say that isn't what they do. And that's great.

but we definitely model the like hey what are you excited about what are you stoked about what's good right now like what question can I ask so that the index of thoughts that you have starts running through what's going okay in life what am I excited about what am I passionate about and like priming you with that is like a cool thing to do again it's so weird because like this is like second nature so I'm like diagnosing what we're doing but I'm just saying hello and introing people but it's also a way that like I know that pulls goodness out of people I know that people feel more significant like they matter if you're finding out what they're stoked about. And then the cool second part is we get to connect people, you know, that have that. But yeah, so it's, it's, it's banned by

model. And if it's asked, then like, you know, it's not like, hey, hey, stop telling your job over there. But, but, but there, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hush. Yeah, hush. But there are many people who I've know now for two years before I know what they do. And you seem to really, for work, I should say. You're very in tune to kind of the human condition. Now I'm going to ask you, what do you do for a living? Yes, I do design. I do product design. Well, where does all this come from? Because product design, I guess product design connects with, there's human connectivity in terms of what your design is trying to, I guess, elicit from a human set of eyes to their brain. But that's different than this.

This is almost sidecar psychology a little bit. Yeah. So I think some of it comes from, man, I'm not going to know the answer. I have to, like, explore this out loud because I don't know. But you do. You really have learned the human condition through this it feels like. Yeah, I think it's, part of it is the design history in that, like, it's a user experience design is what the field would be called.

a lot of people know what that is, and it'll sound like just tech. But there's a component of that that is how do people think about the, or not think about a thing? That almost sounds like industrial psychology. Yeah, like there's this idea in design that like really good design of an app or a physical product is when somebody doesn't notice it. So it's invisible. And that is something that we think about with hush. That's interesting. If you walk up to the place, like we've designed how the table sits.

Like me and Adam will think about, I mean, design is a strong word, but like we're intentional about, We don't want it to feel like there's going to be a line that's going to form ever. So, you know, it's hard today when there's one person. But, like, we'll set up on two sides of a table and in a space where people, it's not obvious, like, do I come from this side to line up or this side? Both sides would work. Okay. So it feels a little uncomfortable.

But what it does is it makes space for people to come and gather around. And that's designed. So that's a choice that we make about how the space will work for people. So when they come up, they're not going to form a line. Hopefully, all things going well, people start to gather around. And that is invisible to anybody there. Nobody knows why they're walking up one side or the other. Nobody knows that we were like, this side?

This side? Where should we put this table? But it's like, cool, the sunlight's good here. We've got a good view. And people won't line up. Great. So that's like design for that human part. And so some of those types of things come from designing physical and digital products.

And then I think there's a whole history of like finding ways to be accepted that informs like a deep desire to connect with people. and it's just a history of being, like, curious and, like, pulling on those threads in life. What do you think is more important? The next presidential election or 40 people having coffee? Well. In terms of our society.

That, like, the real answer is, I would, like, bypass the whole question. Really? Yeah, because there's two parts. And you're welcome to say, Bill, I'm not answering that. No, I mean, I would say policy. No, no, like,

policy impacts a huge amount of people. Sure. But whoever that next person actually does, I don't know. So it's still like, does the election of a single person have a greater impact across more multitude of people? Sure, that's the math. In my world where I am and the things that I can control, my individual vote versus my ability to connect with people, like, I'll just take the connection over people. because for me it's more fulfilling and for the people around me

I think it matters to them for who they are to feel significant to the people around them more so that's why I'm like I almost don't see those as like opposed right they're like two separate things

and so I'd be like well the one is the one but it doesn't have to take all my attention like I make a choice shelf that and now I can go connect with people because it doesn't matter who the president is or isn't or whatever's happening on that front I'm going to choose to still connect with people regardless.

I love that. And you're right, the question sucks. So that's Alex's problem. He wrote it. You wrote that stupid question, and his answer was 50 times better than the question. I knew he was going to give such a beautiful answer. That's why I wrote the question now. Okay, this is crazy. You've had over 50 people apply, and I don't even know if apply is the right word, to start nomadic cafes around the country. country. First, it's apply the right word. And second of all, how do you scale intimate community? You know what I'm saying? I know what you're saying. Yeah, it's a thing I'm curious about for sure because I don't fully know the answer. So yeah, we've had two types of things you can think of as apply. One is like a ton of people saying, can you come do this here? And we're just a small group. So we're

slowly explaining like, hey, on the internet, like this isn't our full-time job. We're here. We'd love to come hang with some of you. And then on the flip side, we did build a system. We started building a system that because of our, you know, some of the design background, it's like, okay, we're going to get an influx of people. Like, we can either say, hey, that's not what we're doing

or we can say, hey, let's see what we can do for people. And so we built a thing where people literally do apply. Apply is probably a strong word. They basically request. They say, hey, I want to start a gathering where I am. Do they call it nomadic coffee? Yeah, we hope so, yeah. Have you trademarked it?

Do we have anybody in the room that can help me? You trademark it? Yeah. No, no. But it's the hush-hush nomadic cafe. And there's a whole map. And I think 65 people have submitted to do that in the last like four weeks. Four weeks?

And I've talked to almost 30 people. How long has this been going on? The nomadic, like which part? The nomadic cafe thing. I mean, we've been doing it for like, this will be our fourth summer doing it. All right. But you've had 60 people in the last, you have a job. How do you deal with 60 people in four weeks calling saying,

I want to do a hush, hush, nomadic cafe, how do I do it? Yeah, yeah. That's crazy, dude. It is crazy. Yeah, that's why we had to build a system. And so I used, like, my tech experience to basically build a system that, like, people are still email. It technically comes through me, but they can submit a thing saying what they're excited about,

what their level of coffee is, what they hope to get from it, and where they're at. And then it goes into like a little, you know, setup I have. And then I can say, cool, okay, here's, here's where everybody is. Let's review them one at a time. And then they get an email that says, hey, if you want to book a call, you can. And that was happening for a few weeks. And I realized I can't do, like, either I can do two or three calls a week or I can do 10 and hate my, like, off work time.

And your wife? And yeah, exactly. I just want to go bike riding with her and hang out with her. And she's just like, you're going pretty hard on this. And I'm like, yeah, I know. So we built an improved system now where basically we're just going to auto run people through. Like we have a whole playbook. It's like 40 pages.

But also there's like three pages that's like just go outside, invite people. Here's how to make coffee. Like it's really, really simple. But then we also go into all the details of like here's the, you know, some of the things that we're thinking about that we're talking about. So that if you want to be more intentional or if it helps you, you can. And then with that, then people basically, they get put into a thing where it's like, hey, here's go ahead and do a practice event. That's it. Take a friend, a few friends, go outside and make coffee, see how it feels, you know, see what's up.

And then the second thing is do a nomadic cafe. Same thing, but just invite some more people. That's it. And once they do those, like the first one, they're on the map. Once they do the event, the little tiny red dot that says maybe something's happening turns into a little gathering. And then they have the option just to like chill on the map. And then they can use our tool to have a whole RSVP tool that doesn't require sign in or anything like that. And so they can use those tools and then they can just be part of the story.

They send us some media. on an app or something. So like if I'm in my Winnebago, traveling the country, I've seen the biggest ball of twine, I've seen everything, and I'm like, you know, let me pull up my hush-hush nomadic coffee app. Oh, look, I'm 30 minutes from a gathering that's happening tomorrow. I think, yeah, so this is what's really interesting. I mean, is that the idea here? There's two types of groups that are going to form, and they're all valid, and there might be more. So one is we're really stoked for people to remix it, however it looks for them, right? So, like, even here in Memphis, like, it's hot out. Like, I think we want some ice coffee out there. Like, there's different ways

we're going to remix it. Or we don't do it in the summer. We do it in the spring or fall. Exactly. Or people are, like, really, or people are really desperate and they will do it inside, you know, like, so it's a remix for where you are. But I think one group is a group like in Mammoth Lakes. Michael's running a group down there now, and he's got his own. Mammoth. Mammoth Lakes, California. Okay. Really cool. Amazing mountains.

It makes my mountains feel small. But he's doing a group out there, and he's done a couple, and he has the invite open, so you can go and subscribe on the app and say, hey, I want a notification whenever Michael does one. And so it's very open. Other people are like, hey, it's more like my 12 friends and maybe a few extras, and we're not really going to let people subscribe. So, like, you might be in your Winnebago past the ball of yarn looking, and it might be like, oh, okay, these ones are a little bit more.

they're just their close, close friends, plus a little extra, you know, small community. Like, they only want 12 people. But then you might say, oh, okay, Michael's not that far away. And he's looking like he's doing, you know, he's gained for 45 people. I'll show up. So that's how I see it working. It's like this network of people that's crazy, depending on how they want to connect. This has developed into that.

It's nuts to me, too. It's also nuts how quick it happened. Because we've been doing it for a while. But then suddenly we just realized, like, oh, people really want to do this where they are. And it'd be really fun. And then if we can make it. So it's not a full-time job, and we have a little system that allows people to opt in, try it out, and then gracefully leave or stay longer. I'm like, cool. That would be really cool.

It also, I mean, it's just like a bell going on to my head. It's also proof positive about how we are longing for community. Dude, people are craving it so much right now, so much. And I will say, I don't know if Alex told you, but like, or maybe I said earlier today, but it's like literally messages from all over the world. So it is kind of crazy. Like the Netherlands, you said. Yeah, yeah. And it's like really exciting for me because I'm like,

whoa, people like are just excited to connect. And some folks, it's coffee. But I think it mirrors like where we are, where we're passionate about the coffee thing and we bring that and that adds to what we're doing. But probably like 25% of people are coming with coffee. Most people are like, this seems cool, but I want to make friends.

I'm somewhere new. I don't know how to connect with people. Like I like the feeling that it seems like you guys are in voting. and they just want to connect with like no reason except for like it would be nice to be human around other humans. So yeah. We'll be right back. Listen. And you're there for heart-wrenching knockouts.

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Listen, inside American soccer with Tom Bogart and Tavern. and the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your podcast. Hey, this is Chuck from Stuff You Should Know, and we're submitting our most sciencey episodes for your peer review with our new stuff you should know doing science playlist. Out now. You want to know about Occam's Razor? Simplest explanation is usually the right one?

We got you covered. Wondered what chaos theory is ever since the first time you saw Jurassic Park. Well, come on down. So distill a nice pot of tea, everybody. Turn down the gas on your Bunsen burner and slip into your most comfortable lab coat. and listen to the stuff you should know doing science playlist on the IHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. So our local service club and Army of normal folks, Memphis, you were here,

hosted its first nomadic cafe with you this morning. Yeah, yeah. Which is what you did right before you got here on two hours of sleep. Yep. So you needed the coffee. I needed the coffee desperately. What was that like? Where was that? How to go?

It was cool. Yeah. So it was at this place called, I think, Tennessee Urban Roots Garden. Urban Roots of Tennessee. Urban Roots of Tennessee. What time was it? It was 7 to 9. Okay, so wasn't that hot yet. Well, for me, it was hot. That was, that was different.

There were two people showed up in suits and they were hot. Two people showed in suits and I was like, whoa, Memphis is a cool vibe. Yeah. Memphis actually does have a cool vibe and you want to talk about diverse. We got some of everything. thing right around here. It looks like the United Nations. But anyway, so how many people showed up? I think about 35 people. Are you kidding? That's great. Good for the Memphis Service Club. Yeah, and like really crazy for me to like drop into like a group I haven't met. And so normally I'm

used to these events where there's like some people I know, you know, I'm going to co-host. And so this was like, okay, cool. I don't, yeah, I don't know anybody. But it was cool to see people like, okay, so two parts. Where was it? It was at this, the urban roots space. And like, to get there, it was kind of like you would go behind like this like alleyway and then there's these like big boxes and you're kind of like, where are we going? And then, but I love that. Like so you're kind of like, is this a cool spot? And then the mystery. And then you come around the corner and you're like, whoa, this is beautiful. And there's this amazing gazebo and it's like really cool to see what's there. And they're like starting this garden is just budding.

An urban garden. In urban garden. And Bill and Raleigh. So it's a beautiful one and a half million dollar urban farm in Raleigh. Oh, okay. Cool. Yeah, so it was really cool. So the space was awesome and it was fun to have this like, am I really going through this like, you know, back area? And then suddenly boom, yeah, this is awesome. And then, you know, people showed up and they shook hands.

And like I got to meet a handful of people. That was really cool. Did you make the coffee? I made all the coffee. I mean, actually, Alex grabs some, but we made most of it. You made the coffee? Oh, yeah. I packed the coffee gear.

Brought it on the plane. I was here short. No, yeah. That is so cool. I brought the coffee kit. You were there, what was it like? One thing when you guys were talking about diversity

and different types of people earlier, I think we were pretty racially diverse today. I mean, I don't know if exact numbers, but I made a good mix of white and black, which is really cool and all kinds of people. Yeah. And I don't know if you know this, Ron,

but Memphis is the largest majority minority city in the country. Oh, I did not know that. No, well. Yeah, it is. And we have a large Hispanic population. We have a growing Vietnamese population. It is a very diverse place. And it does not surprise me at all,

that it didn't look all the same when you showed up. But I love it. That's very cool. There was actually a Nicaragua in there. M.K. Hill, our interview yesterday came with her Guatemalan kid. Yeah, Lewis, he said he works for, it's like a law firm. He does translation for...

Why do you know that? You're not supposed to ask. Well, this is... You rule breaker? Hush. This is a thing where he's passionate about it, though, right? So it's like, it's not his job. It's like, it actually started out with him coming here and like he got married. So his wife was a Memphis person. And so he ended up here. And then he ended up wanting to go into this law space. But he was like a translator. So, you know, so it's like the story of life is pretty cool. And so now that's what he's doing, translating for this immigration law firm. That's very cool. So, yeah, so it was really cool. Who showed up at a suit? I don't know if you met Larry Robinson, but he showed up in a suit. suit. Sure. Who else? Humes didn't show up a suit, did he?

Stephen Green from Agape was pretty dressed up. So was Mark Thompson from V2 Media. Yeah. We're Memphis, folks. We're used to just, you know, in a month and a half from now, you will get out of the shower, towel off, get dry, go outside, before you get your car, you're already soaking wet. And if it's not sweat, it's just literally humidity. Yeah, yeah. We will have days here that are 95 to 100 degrees. Fahrenheit. There won't be a cloud in the sky and it's still 85% humidity. It'll kill you, won't have caches. It's a little different.

That's just, that's just, I mean, we're in, it's the, I mean, this is, yeah, it's just what we do. So anyway, we wear suits in that. We just sweat. I mean, one guy said, he was like, well, I didn't know how to dress, so I just came prepared. And I was like, awesome. Okay, cool. You're in a, you're in a community garden drinking coffee in Memphis in the morning in a suit. And that's the cool remix part. Yeah, I love it too. I'm like, it's cool.

Memphis, it really is. Yeah, yeah. And that's what I had to go to work after. Exactly. Yeah. It would be at all surprising we're standing right next to that guy as some dude with dreds and cutoffs and whatever. Sandals and then the garden tech bringing me blueberries. Like, yeah, it was super cool.

Yeah. That's very good. Actually, Lewis had a cool thing of like making conversation. I love asking people about their tattoos when I see it. Oh, I didn't even know so. So he had one that said, given to fly. Oh. Do you know the reference?

No. But I forgot it. So I asked him, what's that? that what's that mean? And it's his favorite Pearl Jam song. And I'm actually a big Pearl Jam fans. So I've seen him three or four times and he's seen them eight times. But your point about like you just make conversation with

you could have never. Do you learn that in Hushash Cafe? Nomadic. What am I saying? Hushush. Nomatic Cafe. I mean, people either call it an acronym. That thing is long. It's long. People usually call it Hushash. They call it nomadic cafe. Nobody calls it nomadic cafe in real life. I don't think. I think people

like online's a helpful phrase like this is what I'm doing. Cool. But then people will just be like, I'm going to hush. Going to hush. Yeah, so like, we just... Yeah, so we were pretty loose with, like, the language. Again, we'll just see, like, what do people call it?

We need some shorthands so, like, we can make distinction of hush-hush-h-h-h-verses. Like, we can't call everything hush-hush. Do you fat? Do you folks up in Oregon eat hush puppies? Do you even know what a hush puppy is? I do know what it is, yeah. I think, like, there's one food cart that maybe has a questionable one there, you know, kind of thing. Do you know what a hush-peppy is?

It's like a breaded thing. with something in it. In the south, we catfish. There's a no. Oh, okay. You're gonna be a man's plan here. A fish is a huge thing. Okay, yeah.

Somebody did tell me about a catfish they caught today. That was like half the size of the table we were at. All right. Well, cut that in half and that's the truth. Okay. Yeah, that sounds right. That's another thing.

We lie about the length of fish around here constantly. I mean, it's ridiculous. There's nobody that's ever called a 12-inch fish. Yeah. It's 30 inches. Yeah, this was a four-foot fish. Yeah, okay. I'm sure, but they lot.

Yeah. And it's okay. It's okay. Yeah. There's nothing wrong with that line. Anyway, we fillet the catfish, all right, and then you cut them in little pieces, and you bread them in typically some type of cornmeal breading, and you drop it in completely red, hot, fire grease, all right, and outside. All right, so a friar, and then when it gets golden, you pull it out, and catfish is a really white, flaky, not fishy taste, and fish with that. It's a freshwater fish, and it's got that breading over it, and you dip it in tartar sauce or ketchup and it's greatest thing in the world.

And you eat it with french fries. Well, because you do this outside, anytime you had the fish and the smell and the aroma is very distinct and it's sweet and good, and you always have lemon and everything, all the neighborhood dogs would come up and they'd be barking because they want some of the fish. So back in the day, you would ball up some of the meal that you bredded the fish in, dip it in the fryer. And when that came up and it was crunchy, you would throw it to the dogs and say, hush puppy. Oh. That's where hush puppies come from. Okay, cool. Cool, cool.

So we could have hush, hush puppy nomadic. It's a waste of calories. There's so much better uses of calories. Oh, my gosh. Puffies are ronorated? All right, caches, are hush puppies not unbelievable? That seems good. And can you eat catfish without hush puppies?

No. It's a lot. It's kind of like, don't ask what you do. Yeah. But anyway, that's where Ashpuppies come from. I don't say anything to do with this conversation. I mean, I learned something, which is what I'm here for. Maybe.

Most of us absolutely know nothing about Hungarian politics, yours truly included. But you talk up this thing called Tisa. Am I pronouncing that right? So this came out of a conversation I had with a group. Yeah, but yeah. And this particular, I will say this particular correlation was not made by me. Okay. It was a correlation made by, I had a group conversation with Alex and some people where I shared what hush-hush was as like, this is what we're doing.

And honestly, it was like one of these first moments where I realized like, oh, the thing we're doing is like civic because we're gathering people with no agenda. But because we're connecting people and then they care about the community more, it's like a civic action with no agenda. And in that call, somebody called out, and I can't remember her name, but she called out like that this, I think it's called the Tisa Islands. Yeah, it's called the Tisa Island movement. which is in my notes here, and I don't care about the politics of it. I just... Change happened through basically a bunch of decentralized people

having gatherings over the course of, like this country where you couldn't have meetings again, right? But people did it decentralized. See? I wasn't lying. No, no. So it's like 40,000 people doing this across their country decentralized in small groups. And because they were meeting and gathering together, they were then able to kind of understand each other.

I don't know the whole story, but then they were able to make decisions about what was good for them as a community. and have a real impact, even though, like, media and gatherings were, like, shut down a lot more. And so the correlation is that when you're allowing people and encouraging people to gather in these small numbers, like, it does have a meaningful impact across the whole network because people can decide together that, like, they can care about their communities instead of just, like, feeling disengaged and then letting whatever power be sort of centralized the power and the

choices. And it's not, like, nationwide. This is true for smaller communities, too, right? And it's not all like the worst of evils or something. But if you have a local community and people aren't engaged, then whoever's running it gets to make the choices. But if people are engaged and they care about each other and there's a tapestry of ways they can gather, then they can talk and understand each other. And they make choices together in small numbers

for like the good of their own community and be part of it. And I think that's, I mean, that is a very large version of what that speaks to with Hungary. Yeah, but it's just kind of. cool that, you know, this TISA island movement, this idea of separating large groups into little islands of closely knit people in community, but there's, forget the politics of it, but they're still able to change culture in the community when they gather and have community in these little islands and understand one another is really, really interesting.

And not politics-wise, but just community-wise and culturalized. what hush-hush effectively is accomplishing without any agenda to do so. Yeah, yeah. Which is crazy. Yeah, it is definitely crazy, yeah, which is why I have to keep it so secret. You said that you, according to Alex, you hadn't said this to me, but according to Alex, you said you fully don't understand how your childhood shaped nomadic cafe, but you're pretty sure it did.

What does that mean? Yeah, that, yeah. Yeah, it's one of those things where I came from, so classic kid move of classic for some people, right? Like I had a father who was an alcoholic who wasn't around. My mom had to run away from him. And so that informed me early on on like, you know, how men work. So that starts to form these things in you.

And then I had another bad father, I would say. You and I have a lot in common. Yeah, so that changes like how you relate to people and men and like what you see as possible or the tools that you need to be successful or your drive. My mom also ended up being a single mom who worked construction. So I also saw her growing up as like a badass. And like it was like my mom stronger than your dad was like the way I would cope with some of that in elementary school. But I remember driving up to we lived in the outskirts in the country in a place called Crabtree.

And we would have a school in order. again, yeah, tiny, tiny town outside of Albany. And then we would drive up the I-5 corridor and we go to a place in Amsi called Portland. That'd be like a school field trip. And I remember driving up there and like looking for my mom out the window because she was hanging off the side of bridges grinding and pouring concrete and like that was her job. And we were really young, like I remember sleeping in the car on job sites. And so, and there's more about like that, you know, that coming from a place of essentially as poverty on some level, but I still had not opportunity, right? So obviously or else I wouldn't have, you have to have opportunity. Like,

that's the way out or the way up or however you want to frame it. So my mom did all the work to provide those opportunities and I got lucky and all that stuff. So that really gave me this like baseline of just feeling like everybody like deserves some space or some help or some connection. And so early on I just learned that I don't know. There was like this thing. thing like going through school and after, I just always was kind of this thing where I wanted to connect with people that maybe looked like, I don't know, it wasn't even to want. It was just a thing that happened where I would find myself around like, I was, it's weird because I don't even want to categorize people, right? So I'm like struggling with like, were they oddballs? Were they

outcast those things? Was I? But I felt like I was always just trying to connect with people. And I felt very much like, I don't know where we're all coming from, but I had that like deep sense of empathy that like all these people that I'm around that I don't understand like there's something cool about them and where they come from and like I think that's probably also why like the part about wanting to kill status because I know that there's like worth in people and the status thing can get in the way so like if you start to suss up status based on what somebody's done then you can like forego their worth where you can you can misrecognizing that in people so I think that's early on what was informed in that.

And then the follow-up, just to complete the story thing because my mom ever listens to this, is that I also ended up having a great dad. So later in life, he married my mom when I was like 18 or 17 or something. And he was awesome. Treated my mom really well, and he was like a really good dude. And I lost him last year.

So that was like the informed path of like fathers in my life. And so that really does inform like the heart behind I didn't expect to be so emotional this whole time, but that's like, it's just what it is. But those things inform, like, how this, like, how the things we, like, express in what we're doing come about. And I know Adam also, like, he had a bout with cancer early on. And so he's got his own way of, like, seeing the world

and seeing, like, how fleeting things is. And so, like, that's, like, all of those life experiences that we have, like, they inform how we operate and the things that we find joy in. We'll be right back. Listen. And you're there. For heart-wrenching knockouts. Threatening triumph.

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It's interesting when I hear you talk. I'm so happy for you that finally at some age you got that. your life, right? For me, it was my children. I got to reframe a fatherhood as a father. Yeah. And but I get exactly where you're coming from that in the oddest way, it does, it does create some level of empath in the way you approach people. I guess because you feel in a very well way what it feels like to be on the outs. Yeah, yeah, I think that's right. Right. Yeah. And so you want people to be in. So let's create a secret club.

Because you know. Everybody's also invited. Because you know what it feels like to want to be on the end. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think a lot of people do. I think there is that desire for belonging. Yeah, and it is pretty funny. So to do that, you create a secret club. Nice job. Yeah, exactly. That's a little bit compelling. Yeah.

But it's not that secret. The secret's fun. Yeah. I'm going to croak one day, and I think I'm older than you, so I'll croak before you do. But when you do croak, what do you hope people will say about nomadic cafe and what it will be when you're dead and gone? Well, I don't know. There's like a, like the answer I would hope I'd almost strive for is like that invisible by design thing. Like if they, like they wouldn't even have to say anything about it. But if they had the experience, like that would be enough, you know?

That's so cool. That is such a cool answer. You really don't give two quips if it's about anything you did, do you? It just doesn't, it's not that it doesn't matter. It's that, like, I care what I'm doing, but I don't get to, like, hold on to the experience that everybody else has. That's the gift I give away. So in doing it, that's what I give. And then if they reflect that back, awesome, I'll take it. If they can't or don't know it's from me or whatever, then that's okay too. So, yeah, I mean, I care, but it's like I care about my input into it and whatever the outcome is like, I'll receive it or let it go. It is what it is, yeah. You know, I know the 60 calls in the last four months or whatever the time frame and number of the calls is, it's too many and too short at times.

Seems like a lot. But after this airs, you're probably going to get another number group of them. And to save you that trouble, is there a way to find nomadic, cafe hush-hush thing online? Yeah. So there's two ways. Hush-hush-coffee.com because we have,

apparently we have coffee. That's funny. Apparently there's coffee involved in this. You can actually, I mean, you pitch it a little bit more. You could sign up to be a member of your coffee club. Oh, yeah. We have a coffee club. So like, if you love what we're doing, if you love our coffee,

especially if you're west of the Rockies, we ship everywhere in the U.S. It's just, you know, people have their own local coffee as well. I'm really bad at pitching. stuff. I'm just like, don't buy from us. Like, it's fine. Do your own thing. Hold it. Hold it. You actually sell coffee? We actually sell coffee. What are you going to mention that, dude? I wasn't. We don't mention it. The things. I hope your partner is better at marketing than you. He's way better. He's going to be upset. He's going to be like, Ron. He's like, I told you to talk less.

So you can buy your coffee at hushush coffee.com. Okay. So if I want to start a nomadic thing and I want to use hushush coffee. I can buy the hushush coffee and then do the nomadic cafe with real live, hush-h-h-h-h-h-coffee. Yeah, yeah. And we have, like, for hosts- You didn't pitch that once. No, I... Nope. Nice job.

Hush, hush, coffee is going broke from a lack of marketing. Yes. He gave us... The best coffee in the world to never be known. He gave his speech this morning, and he didn't mention that they've had ones there as big as 140 people. He didn't mention that they've had over 50 applications. And I'm like, I would have shamelessly promoted both of those things.

Yeah, he's just this dude making coffee in the heat with some garden somewhere. They probably thought I got hired or something. I was a caterer. It's fine. It's not right. That's cool. So you could actually, honest to God, didn't even know it. Yeah, so we have a thing.

It's the hush, hush coffee club. We've got 160 members, half are local, half or somewhere else. It's small but growing. And the thing is, like one bag we call regular but better, because that's what it is. The other we call aha. And we change it every single month. because we are passionate about coffee. So every month we road to take the coffee.

And because it's more mystery and surprise. It's more mystery. It's surprise. It's fun. Uh-huh. Yeah. So that's what we do. So you have two types of coffee.

Hush, hush, regular coffee, and then the surprise. And you get them both together. So it's like every month we ship two. So you sign it for the membership. You get one of each. And that's what makes it kind of fun. And then we cured the coffee.

That's great. I love that. Yeah. So it's really cool. And then for hosts, we're trying to find a way to do like wholesale for the host because they're already giving their time. and we've got a platebook for them.

Of course. Don't make any money on that. God forbid. It would be the worst, right? Nice marketing job again. He's good. You should be a business. Good Lord, Ron. No, we need some help.

Yeah, so you can find the coffee there, and then we also have the nomadic cafe. Like, you find the map. So how do you do the nomadic, do you go to nomadiccafe.com or something? It's hush-dush, coffee.com. There's a thing that says the map. You go there, and there's a big button at the top says, start a gathering, start a automatic cafe. I got it. Yeah. So it's all through plus rush well yeah now that makes sense. You're actually driving the public to your website first. Yeah. Yeah. And we also provide kits.

So one of the like we're what's happening is we are small. And so as we learn what people want, we're making it available. So we heard people want kits to start like oh, they see what we're doing. That's really cool. Great. So now we have kits. So also hosts can buy kits from us, you know, we'll make something there helps us do more for sure. And the kit has like a little starter of everything you need. So yeah. So it's it's, it's, it's, there. It's, but it's like, it's at the beginning, but it's like budding really fast all of a sudden. And so, yeah, we're just figuring out as we go. Unbelievable story. How do we find Ron?

So we have a mutual friend, Matt Abrams. I happen to be on our phone call where Ron was presenting. And I think Matt even calling me out. He's like, you're going to have Ron on the podcast, aren't you? Yeah, I mean, it's awesome. Did you check out? It is exactly. Once again, you're not spending tons. of money. It's not what you do for a living. It's just, you have no agenda. You're just trying to commute, just in an interesting way, create community, and you're just a dude doing it. And I mean,

again, if we had millions of people across the landscape of our country, find them ways to create community like this, I think so much of what's ailing us in our culture can change. and you're just a dude making coffee and creating a fun, cool way to have community. I mean, who can't do that? I literally everybody can. And that's, I think what I'm excited about doing is after talking to all these people, it's like, oh, like, you don't need to, you really don't need to know that much. It's the two steps are like, go outside and try it out, then invite people.

And it takes time. That's it. Time and a little bit of like putting yourself out there, but that's really it. And especially for a small group, you know, know once we get bigger it's like oh there's like more things to consider but 12 people it's just make coffee it's easy easy yeah both two things related to us i think the memphis club will continue doing it so that's cool it'll be up to lydia and her team but i really hope all the service clubs i was gonna say this we need to introduce this i did all the service clubs i shared it with all

them um and even if you're enlistators if you're thinking about doing a service club this could actually be a cool way to like test the ground you can start doing this you know first too um And then I've thought about this, particularly for Memphis, but I think it's true everywhere. It's a really cool way to explore a community, too. Like so many, I mean, especially here, we have a problem with people like creeping on the community. But it's like if we can actually show them really cool, different parts of the community they've never been before and grow appreciation for your community. That's a really interesting point for urban areas that, you know, you get all these suburbanites are like, I don't want to go downtown to get mugged, all the homeless people. this, all that, and they're missing out on so much culture in cities across country.

But if you host these things at cool areas, you don't just have to be in the mountains. There's pretty places and urban areas, too. 100%. Yeah, I mean, today was a really great example of that. And parks. Yeah, we were awesome. We were a spot in North Memphis and it was cool, yeah. Yeah. So you're outside.

It was pretty, but you weren't in the mountains. You're in an urban area. But there's probably people that came to that who had never even knew that area existed that are from here. I remember somebody was like, I was walking out here, then I saw somebody else with a mug, and I was like, I guess this is the right place to go. So, yeah.

Perfect. Yeah, yeah, it's cool. Only four of the 35 people I'd ever been to that location before. See? Yeah. Native Memphis. Yeah. I mean, the point is well taken, Alex, that it is a way for urbanites to explore their own city.

Yeah. And find the beauty in it. Yeah. Especially newcomers, too. I met a couple of newcomers, you know, today, too. If people get to town, don't know anybody. How in the world? Did you get the word out about this?

So our Memphis Service Club has 470 members. So that's pretty helpful. Ron actually did an awesome social media post. If people don't follow hush-hush coffee on Instagram, you should go do it. I think it's got like 5,000 views on it. I know some of your ones are that even more. But I think that recruited probably 10 people. You're going to get some calls, dude.

Yeah. That's fine. We'll take them. Yeah. Sorry, Julia. It's coming. Does Julia go? Yeah, yeah, definitely.

Yeah. She's into it. Yeah, she goes. She brings the dogs. or sometimes one of the dogs. Yeah, it's great. And she has a bike shop. So, like, we, again, we do these Friday things there

where we do for two hours. We do drip coffee. We call it drip session. We do sell coffee there, but it's, you know, small little thing. But that, again, is this space where we call it, like, public public. So, like, when you're at home, it's private.

In a cafe, it's like you're in public, but it's still private. You're hanging with your people. So we have this space where you show up, and it's public, public, public. There's almost no seats. So you got private. You got public, public, public.

And then you got public. public. Let's go. Yeah. And then hush, hush, public, public. Everything is sets of two. Ron, I can see why people would want to show up. You're funniest. I mean, I'd like to hang out with you drink coffee. God only knows what's going to come out of your mouth next.

I love it. Anything else do you want to cover Ron? No, that's great. No, I mean, people can find, they can find the coffee. They can find the network. They might have cool ideas for how to collaborate. Obviously, we're a small crew, but send it our way. so no, everything's good.

And next time I'm in Oregon, I look you up and I come to a hush-off no matter coffee experience. Yeah, please do. Yeah, it'd be rad. I love it. Ron, thanks for the two hours of sleep, sweating the ride here, and safe travel zone. When's your next deal? Okay, so we actually don't know what's really fun about it is for us.

How come that doesn't surprise me that you don't know? We, it's like, it's by the nature. I also think this is why it makes it easier for people to do because you don't have to have a schedule. You're just like, it's fun for us. Pop-up. And if Adam, you know, Adam also has a family, he's got a three and a half year old. If the week's rough, it's like, we thought we were going to do something Friday,

but don't, never mind, let's not do it. You know, Wednesday comes around. We're like, we're not telling anybody. Maybe we'll try the next week. So we can just roll with what feels good also. And so then we can send the word out two days before, and people are stoked and they come hang, and it's great. How many of these do you do a year, probably?

We do right now. about one every six weeks. I'm talking about not the public public or the private, but the private public, public, private? Yeah, yeah, that one. The hush-hush, we do about every six weeks right now. Okay, so I'd love to do it sooner. Eight, nine a year?

Yeah, that's right, yeah. And sometimes we do more, like collage and stuff. I mean, it's no stress. You don't even have to sweat that. No, it's easy, yeah. It keeps it fun. And we do it in the winter where we're out, like sometimes it's in the snow and like sometimes it's in a park and it's easy.

We're going to do a few more by the nature of keeping them smaller. So as the internet part grows bigger, we, we, we were able to actually like still go smaller in the real world and that's like really awesome. Actually tell a bill about the one that you did on the river, like on the river. Yeah, a lot of people in town still talk about this and we're going to do it again this year. But we literally, if you want to look it up, you can go see the video on the social media, but we got a huge one of those dock rafts that you can get float up like paddle boards is like, you know, 10 by 10. And then me and Adam got lawn chairs and we pre-brewed a bunch of ice coffee.

And then we're like, hey, we're going to be like in the river. Here's the pin, like paddleboard or swim. to get to us. And so then that's what we did. And we had, I don't know, there was 50, 60 people there with paddleboards. It was awesome. It was awesome.

Just gathered out there at the water. Yeah, and I understand, like, bend where we're at, like that's part of the culture there. So that's the way that we remix what we're doing. It's really fun. It's really fun to get ridiculous. Yeah.

That's so cool. Ron, Safe Travels Home. Thanks for coming. Thanks for sharing your story. And most importantly, thanks for making a difference in community. And hopefully, being an inspiration and providing a blueprint for something that any and all of our listeners

can look up and emulate and do in their own community. So hush-hush-h-h-coffee and nomadic cafes, guys, you can go to hush-hash-coffee.com, find out more. Ron, safe trip home. Thank you. Yeah. And thank you for joining us this week. If Ron Sparks has inspired you in general or,

better yet to take action by applying on their website to host a hush-hush nomadic cafe in your community or something else entirely. Let me know. I really do want to hear about it. You can write me anytime at bill at normalfolks.us. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with friends on on social, subscribe to the podcast, rate it, review it. Join the army at normalfolks.us. Join or start one of our local service clubs, take the 10-level challenge, and buy our merch. There's so much to do, all of these things that can help us grow. An army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney. Until next time, do it you can. Joy is essential, and it's also elusive. But now, there's a new and exciting way to start your journey toward a more joyful existence. Joy 101. It's a new podcast hosted by me.

Hoda Kotby. If you're craving inspiration to maximize your joy, tune into these candid, uplifting, and moving on-air chats. Listen to Joy 101 on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Joy 101 with Hoda Kotby is presented by CVS. American Soccer is exploded. The knockout rounds are here. The U.S. won their group, and now every match is winner go home. I'm Tad Ramos.

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