With Coffee Cultures closed, it's momentarily quieter at the top of Park Street. (It's also feeling empty because another long-term tenant just departed. She and her staff crafted custom orthodontic appliances using industrial-grade 3D printers — a real diversity of businesses in a single small complex that exists only because of the removal of Alameda's old parking-minimum requirements.) The new owners are currently preparing their new cafe and will be reopening to the public soon.

In the meantime, I found another source for coffee: Minnesota.

I asked around on a coffee brewing forum for recommendations for independent roasters in Minneapolis and St. Paul — and ordered some beans.

If you'd like to also make the smallest of gestures to support some small businesses dealing with unthinkable conditions outside their front doors, here are some options:

• Misfit Coffee
• SK Coffee
• Silverbird Roasting Co.
• Dogwood Coffee Co.
• Bichota Coffee

And after you receive and brew your fancy coffee, you can drink it while reading geography professor Bill Lindeke's recent column titled "In occupied Minneapolis, neighborhood barricades rightly slow injustice":

In response, neighborhood activists have deployed a tactic straight out of the history books. To reduce ICE mobility and dangerous driving, observers in South Minneapolis have been erecting small, DIY traffic circles on wide streets or intersections that have been prone to vehicular mayhem. At these traffic-calming demonstrations, observers will ask drivers to slow down and briefly check whether or not they are ICE agents.

The strategy has caught the attention of the higher ups, usually a sign that something is working. Homan, executive associate director for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, mocked the approach during a recent news conference, and local police seem determined to remove these barricades soon after they are erected. In response, neighbors often simply put them back after police have departed the scene. 

For my part, I think these are a useful tool for communities and, for the time being, local officials should turn a blind eye. After weeks of ICE-driven mayhem on South Minneapolis streets, these interventions reduce the everyday danger faced by these communities. Until actual law enforcement can restore order in Minneapolis, any tactic that slows traffic and gives peaceful observers agency is a good step forward.

Midterm elections can't come soon enough. In the meantime, thank you and good luck to everyone peacefully holding their own and speaking up on behalf of their neighbors across the Twin Cities and the country.