Chapter 13.5: Coffee

When I started to drink coffee I used to count how many cups I'd ever had. Among the first couple were Irish coffees, imbued with a shot of Jameson and topped with whipped cream and Crème de Menthe. Coffee was something I didn't expect to be a major part of my life.

For years now, however, I've started my mornings with a cup or two. I look forward to it. It's not the flavor, though I have become aware of what strikes me as bad, weak coffee. It's not the sweetness of the spoonful of sugar I drop into my cup. It isn't a way to wake up, though I'm not above using common phrases like "I'm just having my coffee, I can't think yet." It's more the routine it provides. It's a stalling tactic. Coffee is an accessory.

Coffee is still not a major part of my life, though it's become a usual segment of my mornings. When I worked in New York, I spent a few minutes picking up my coffee with a cinnamon-raisin bagel. The Indian guy at the deli knew exactly what I wanted and had it waiting for me by the time I'd gotten to the register. We exchanged smiles in addition to the dollar or so it cost. Those were tall cups of coffee. I loved how the hollow stirrer shot out little balls of coffee that skimmed across the surface when I tapped it on the rim of the Styrofoam. It was like a science experiment to me: how fast do the circles of coffee exist before they become part of the whole?

These days, I have a small pad where I sit my coffee cup, marked with my alma mater's name, and sip at the morning. I go through the hundred or so emails I receive each morning, read the headlines of three or four newspapers, an article or two, and get into the day. Within a half hour, I go for another cup of coffee. Sometimes, rarely, I grab another cup later in the day. It's an extravagance, and it usually ties up my belly.

I don't count the cups of coffee anymore. When they're a dessert, it usually means I want a drink of alcohol more than a caffeine fix. It's only at 5 a.m. when I can't sleep that I miss the days of early "coffee-hood." And I do look forward to putting on my shield, armed with my coffee cup to face the increasing vagaries of work. Still, coffee is not enough.