The residual representation of $G_{\mathbb Q_{p}}$ attached to an eigencuspform is markedly different depending on whether $p$ divides the coefficient $a_{p}$, the non-ordinary case, or not, the ordinary case (the representation is reducible if and only if $p$ does not divide $a_{p}$; this translates into very different behaviors for $p$-adic families of cuspforms). But what does $p$ divides $a_{p}$ mean? It means more precisely that, after a choice of an embedding $i_{p}$ of $\bar{\mathbb Q}$ inside $\bar{\mathbb Q}_{p}$, the $p$-adic norm of $i_{p}(a_{p})$ is not 1.
 
The eigencuspform $f=q+\alpha q^{2}-\alpha q^{3}+(\alpha^{2}-2)q^{4}+(-\alpha^{2}+1)q^{5}+\cdots\in S_{2}(\Gamma_{0}(389))$ where $\alpha$ is a root of $x^{3}-4x-2$ is $5$-ordinary for two of the embeddings of $\mathbb Q[X]/(X^3-4X-2)$ into $\bar{\mathbb Q}_{5}$ but not for the third one (because 1 is a root of $x^{3}-4x-2$ modulo 5).