I am on a quest to drink coffee.
Let me state upfront that I am not a coffee drinker. I worked at Dunkin Donuts for years and never
discovered any palatable way to endure coffee.
I love the smell of it; I just cannot tolerate the taste of it.
People usually have two reactions to this quest. The first reaction is, "Why at your age
would you want to start drinking coffee while the rest of us are suffering
severe bouts of withdrawal trying to wean ourselves off of it?" The second reaction is, "Who the frig
doesn't drink coffee?" Me, that's who. I am probably the only person in the entire
civilized world who does not drink coffee.
I truly want to like coffee.
I see how happy it makes people in the morning. I have a coworker who cannot speak coherently
nor listen attentively without a shot of the stuff. At cold sporting events, coffee is often a
free or reasonably priced way to keep warm inside the body, whereas I just hold
it until the entire cup goes cold.
People comment about how they prefer one coffee over another, or
Starbucks over Dunkins over Honeydew over this one and that one. People vehemently argue about coffee brands
in the store. Some shoppers even grind
their own coffee, a smell that makes me nostalgic when I walk through the aisle
that is, coincidentally, the same one that houses tea and hot chocolate and the
baking goods (like chocolate chips and cake mixes and small plastic tubs of
fudge frosting).
I want to try pumpkin-spiced coffee and like it. I honestly do. Every time I taste the specialty coffees like
the ones with caramel or peppermint or mocha, I almost like the first few
sips. Then I get a mouthful of the
coffee that has mysteriously settled to the bottom, and I shiver. It's the same face every time no matter how
valiantly I fight it off -- my nose scrunches, then my whole faces pinches in,
and my entire skull shakes back and forth.
This always ends the same way, too, with my mouth sagging bitterly and
the expression "yeeeeeeeeesh" leaking out of its corners. This is, for folks who've seen it, an
involuntary response that I have been unsuccessful at avoiding.
I try coffee again this morning. I do own a coffee maker, which is probably a
strange truth, so I brew myself about twelve ounces' worth and use the smallest
mug I can find (the one that says Bitch Bitch Bitch on it). I start with Dunkin Donuts creamer and take a
sip. It tastes like Betty Botter's
bitter butter. I add sugar. Lots of sugar. Hmmmm, almost drinkable. I take about three small sips and dump it down
the sink.
I repeat the process adding York Peppermint Patty creamer,
taste it, react almost the same way, and add some sugar. Two sips later, it's a goner, as well. I take the pot off the hot pad at this point,
the glass container still holding a few ounces of my brewed arch nemesis.
Defeat, yet again. Well, sort of. I did manage to drink about one ounce of the
stuff before I trashed it all.
I know, I know.
You're all calculating different ways to season and enjoy coffee that
you're planning to share with me. I can
hear your brains turning because that tiny bit of coffee I inhaled is making me
jump around and tic like the Tourette's Guy (Shit! Bob Saget!) on speed, so my senses are in
overdrive right now. Everybody just stop
think-talking at once so I can form a thought, will you, please.
I truly do wish I liked coffee. I could smile and chat pleasantly at faculty
breakfasts like all of you do when the coffee box arrives, or so that I could
swear and spit and rage like all of you do when no one brings free coffee to
the faculty breakfasts. I feel so damn
left out sometimes.
But I've accepted my fate.
If I were desperate enough, I could grab a coffee and put enough cream
and sugar in it to make it taste like a luke-warm coffee shake and maybe drink
two or three ounces of it. Reality is
I'm a tea drinker: Earl Gray, oolong, Orange Pekoe, Constant Comment, and some
unbelievable Turkish apple tea my son and his bride brought back from their
honeymoon. I like hot cocoa and can
drink it with or without marshmallows, with or without whipped cream, or the
way many New Englanders drink it with a dollop of Fluff.
Coffee and I are never going to get along. I just sneezed, and the whiff of my own
coffee breath from deep inside my nasal tract almost sent me into
apoplexy. I will sniff coffee from afar
and continue to enjoy its freshly-ground aroma; I will jealously watch coffee
drinkers wake themselves at morning meetings and warm themselves at frosty
lacrosse games.
Coffee, we have made
our peace, but truth be known, we will never
truly be friends.
Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to break in my brand new
tea kettle and fill Bitch Bitch Bitch with some tea and honey. Salud!
